Tausi Insider

Sam Bankman-Fried chief executive of FTX, a crypto derivatives exchange that offers products unavailable to traders in the U.S., sits in the company's offices in Hong Kong, on May, 26, 2021. LAM YIK FEI/The New York Times News Service Adam Chisholm is a partner and group head of the complex disputes and regulatory regimes group at McMillan LLP and has experience in securities regulatory and administrative law. The views expressed are his own. Is bitcoin a security? A commodity? Something else? These simple questions have traditionally not had simple answers, even in places where there are modern securities laws. There is one difference between jurisdictions around the world, however. The Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) – Canada’s de facto chief regulator, given the province’s status as a financial centre – has chosen to align with the United States in taking zealous enforcement action against cryptocurrency trading platforms. The recent implosion of the US$32-billion-dollar, ...

Canada’s top court on Friday denied plastics company Nova Chemicals’ appeal of a C$645-million ($482-million) payment awarded to the Dow Chemical Co in a patent infringement case. The Supreme Court of Canada upheld a ruling by a lower court that had awarded the amount to the Dow Inc unit, calculated based on profits Nova made due to the patent breach. Nova disputed those calculations in its appeal of that ruling. https://www.tausiinsider.com/supreme-court-upholds-dows-record-645-million-patent-infringement-award/?feed_id=334663&_unique_id=6483a3977843f

Two law firms have filed suit against Barrick Gold Corp. in Ontario Superior Court on behalf of 21 Tanzanians who allege that they or their family members were killed, injured or tortured by police guarding a Barrick gold mine. The case, filed on Wednesday morning, is the first to be pursued against Barrick in Canadian courts for alleged human rights violations at its mines abroad. It follows a landmark Supreme Court of Canada ruling in 2020 that allowed a Vancouver-based mining company to be sued in British Columbia for alleged abuses in Eritrea. The Tanzanian plaintiffs, Indigenous Kurya villagers who live in communities around Barrick’s North Mara gold mine in northern Tanzania, are accusing the police of five deaths, five injuries and five incidents of torture. They say Barrick is liable because the police are paid and equipped by Barrick under a formal agreement between the company and the Tanzanian Police Force. Barrick says it does not supervise or control the police who patr...

Rogers Communications Inc. says the Competition Bureau’s appeal of its $20-billion takeover of Shaw Communications Inc. should be dismissed, claiming the law enforcement agency overlooked key facts and wrongly interpreted the Competition Tribunal’s assessments of evidence as legal error. In documents submitted to the Federal Court of Appeal, Rogers RCI-B-T made its case on behalf of Shaw SJR-B-T and Videotron Ltd. in response to the written arguments submitted last week by Competition Commissioner Matthew Boswell. In December, the Competition Tribunal had dismissed the bureau’s claims that the merger would result in less competition among telecommunications providers in Canada. The companies and the bureau will face off before the court on Jan. 24. The bureau has argued that the tribunal should have initially considered the deal only between Rogers and Shaw, without the Freedom Mobile divestiture as a remedy to the loss of competition that could result from the takeover. In its factu...

The Federal Court of Appeal has dismissed the Competition Bureau’s challenge of Rogers Communications Inc.’s RCI-B-T proposed $20-billion takeover of Shaw Communications Inc. SJR-B-T, bringing a deal that has faced repeated hurdles for close to two years a major step closer to the finish line. Final approval for the takeover, which would combine Canada’s two largest cable networks and create an opportunity for Montreal-based telecom Videotron Ltd. to expand its business westward, now rests with federal Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne. Mr. Champagne said in a statement on Tuesday after the court ruling that he will issue a decision “in due course.” In order to approve the transaction, Mr. Champagne has to allow the transfer of Shaw’s wireless licences to Quebecor Inc.’s QBR-B-T Videotron, which has struck a deal to acquire Shaw’s Freedom Mobile wireless carrier for $2.85-billion. The federal government has said its priority is to ensure that the deal between Rogers and S...

The Federal Court of Appeal has dismissed the Competition Bureau’s challenge of Rogers Communications Inc.’s RCI-B-T proposed $20-billion takeover of Shaw Communications Inc. SJR-B-T, bringing a deal that has faced repeated hurdles for close to two years a major step closer to the finish line. Final approval for the takeover, which would combine Canada’s two largest cable networks and create an opportunity for Montreal-based telecom Videotron Ltd. to expand its business westward, now rests with federal Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne. Mr. Champagne said in a statement on Tuesday after the court ruling that he will issue a decision “in due course.” In order to approve the transaction, Mr. Champagne has to allow the transfer of Shaw’s wireless licences to Quebecor Inc.’s QBR-B-T Videotron, which has struck a deal to acquire Shaw’s Freedom Mobile wireless carrier for $2.85-billion. The federal government has said its priority is to ensure that the deal between Rogers and S...