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Canada’s largest market watchdog is trying to drive a square peg through a round role in its greenwashing case against Som Seif and Purpose Investments Inc., Mr. Seif’s lawyer argued Wednesday during the second day of hearings into what is expected to be a months-long legal battle. The Ontario Securities Commission alleges that Purpose and Mr. Seif, one of Canada’s best-known money managers, made 19 false or misleading statements about environmental, social and governance, or ESG, investing over several years. Proceedings before the Capital Markets Tribunal, an independent division of the OSC, began Tuesday and are scheduled to continue through September. Veteran securities lawyer Joseph Groia of Groia & Company, who is representing Mr. Seif, accused the OSC of presenting information “in a selective manner to construct a narrative that simply is not true.”
Pension funds and other asset owners are far more likely to back shareholder-led resolutions than asset managers, according to new research that shows voting results at corporate annual meetings often fail to reflect investors’ objectives on climate, diversity and human rights. Internationally, asset owners support proposals on sustainability-related issues at about a third higher rate than the managers they retain to handle some or all of their of their portfolios. Divergence in voting presents market and reputational risks for the asset owners, says the report from the proxy voting consultancy OxProx and Vancouver-based Kaivalya Research. The trends extend to Canada, though the disconnect in voting intentions is less pronounced, the research shows.
En commission parlementaire, elle a été bombardée de questions par l’opposition concernant un autre bourbier informatique, le Système d’information en finances et en approvisionnement (SIFA) du réseau de la santé. Mme Duranceau a défendu le bilan de son gouvernement en faisant valoir qu’une minorité de projets dépassait les échéances et les budgets. Mais des zones d’ombre demeurent nombreuses concernant le SIFA, critiqué durement notamment par l’Autorité des marchés publics (AMP). Le projet actuellement suspendu en raison entre autres de l’explosion des coûts a fait l’objet d’au moins trois avertissements au gouvernement, incluant un audit, a-t-on indiqué en commission. Néanmoins, « Santé Québec considère que le projet doit aller de l’avant », a précisé Mme Duranceau.
An EU plan to gradually reduce the number of free CO2 permits given to industries has hit resistance from six governments that have demanded looser rules to help firms cope with the energy price impact of the Iran war, a document seen by Reuters showed. The European Commission proposed new rules this month on the number of free emissions permits industries will receive until 2030. With concerns mounting about the faltering competitiveness of the 27-member European Union, Brussels said the change would have the overall impact of lowering the carbon costs industry has to pay by €4 billion ($4.66 billion) by the end of the decade, by reducing the number of free allocations handed out more slowly than initially expected. But Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Greece, Poland, Romania and Slovakia have asked the Commission to instead freeze the number of the CO2 permits given out for free at last year's levels.
Prime Minister Mark Carney is in New York City Thursday to meet with business leaders as the relationship between Canada and the United States remains rocky ahead of a review of the continental trade pact. The Prime Minister’s Office has not identified the CEOs, entrepreneurs, business leaders and money managers Carney is expected to meet with to pitch Canada as an investment destination. Carney is also set to deliver remarks at the Economic Club of New York outlining Canada’s new economic strategy and the progress made so far. The trip comes as Mexican and American officials meet this week for negotiations on the Canada-U.S.-Mexico-Agreement on trade, better known as CUSMA.
Universal Music Group shareholder Bollore Group said it was calling on the record label to reject a $65 billion bid from Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square Capital, a move that could derail efforts from the billionaire to seize the world’s largest music company. Cyrille Bollore, chief executive of the Bollore Group, said Ackman’s bid undervalued Universal. Pershing Square Capital in April offered 30.40 euros a share in a cash-and-stock deal that values Universal’s current stock outstanding at 55.89 billion euros, equivalent to $65.01 billion. “I don’t think that this offer is positive. I don’t think it would be positive for the company and I encourage UMG management to reject that offer,” Bollore told shareholders at the company’s annual general meeting on Wednesday.
Billionaire Tilman Fertitta has reached an agreement to buy Caesars Entertainment for about $5.7 billion. Fertitta’s company, Fertitta Entertainment, will pay Caesars shareholders $31 a share and assume about $11.9 billion of the casino company’s outstanding debt, the companies said Thursday. Shares of Caesars were up 1.5% in premarket trading. Fertitta was in talks to buy Caesars for around $7 billion, The Wall Street Journal reported in March, fending off a competing offer from billionaire investor Carl Icahn’s firm. Fertitta will add Caesars’ more than 50 resorts to a portfolio that includes the Golden Nugget casino chain and other hospitality and gaming businesses, as well as the restaurant company Landry’s and the NBA’s Houston Rockets.
For years, Purpose Investments Inc. did not incorporate environmental, social and governance factors into its investment decisions anywhere near the extent that the company and its founder had repeatedly asserted, the Ontario Securities Commission alleged in a hearing on Tuesday. The company’s high-profile greenwashing case is before the Capital Markets Tribunal, an independent division of the OSC. It is expected to span several months, with multiple witnesses expected to testify, before concluding in September. Tuesday was the first day of hearings. The OSC first alleged in September, 2025, that Purpose and its founder, Som Seif, made 19 false or misleading statements about ESG investing between 2019 and 2023.
Nvidia’s chief executive said on Wednesday the chip company plans to invest around $150 billion a year in Taiwan, terming it the “epicentre” of the AI revolution and predicting it will be the world’s tech manufacturing hub for a long time. “Four years ago, five years ago, Nvidia was spending about 10, 15 billion dollars a year in Taiwan. Now we’re spending 100, going to 150 billion dollars in Taiwan each year,” CEO Jensen Huang said at a launch celebration in Taipei for the $5 trillion chipmaker’s planned Taiwan headquarters. The project will break ground this year and aims to be operational in 2030, Huang said. He did not provide a timeframe for the number of years the company plans to invest $150 billion.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton ousted four-term U.S. Senator John Cornyn on Tuesday, riding President Donald Trump's endorsement to a runoff victory for the Republican Senate nomination, U.S. media projected. The race was called shortly after polls closed in Texas' westernmost counties, which are in a separate time zone from most of the state. "Without a shadow of a doubt, I will be the Democrats' No. 1 target in November," Paxton said in his victory speech. "Texas will be the radical left's No. 1 priority, but ... we're not going to let them take it." Paxton's win will force Cornyn into retirement early next year - and the Republican political establishment in Washington into embracing a candidate it has long opposed.
Prime Minister Mark Carney says he’s known for a while that former cabinet minister and Liberal MP Steven Guilbeault could leave politics and that he understands his decision. Mr. Guilbeault, a career environmentalist, is expected to announce his departure from Parliament-elected political life at his party’s caucus meeting Wednesday morning, three Liberal sources told The Globe and Mail on Tuesday. The Globe is not identifying the sources, who were not authorized to discuss the confidential plans. Mr. Guilbeault previously resigned from Mr. Carney’s cabinet over his disagreement with the government’s energy accord with Alberta and its dismantling of marquee climate policies from the Trudeau era.
Buyout group CVC Capital Partners sold its stake in Naturgy Energy Group, raising 3.07 billion euros ($3.57 billion), weeks after BlackRock exited its entire investment in the Spanish energy group. Rioja Acquisition, a company controlled by CVC, sold shares representing an 11.08% stake in Naturgy at 28.55 euros apiece, bookrunner Goldman Sachs Bank Europe said Wednesday. The price represents a 4.6% discount to Naturgy’s closing price on Tuesday. The sale means CVC has offloaded its entire 13.8% stake in Naturgy, Goldman Sachs Bank Europe said. CVC settled certain financial contracts with Goldman Sachs Bank Europe, resulting in the sale of an additional 2.72% stake in Naturgy, the bank added.
Spanish defence company Indra has appointed Josep Maria Recasens as chief executive starting in mid-June, it said on Tuesday, recruiting Renault's strategy chief after the departure of several top officials from Indra. Recasens has served as Renault Group's chief strategy officer since November. For two years before that, he worked at Renault's electric car division, Ampere, first as COO then CEO. Indra, which is 28% owned by the Spanish government through state holding company SEPI, said the change would take effect on June 17. Last week, Indra said that the contract of its previous CEO Jose Vicente de los Mozos would not be renewed. Chairman Angel Escribano resigned a month ago after conflict-of-interest allegations over his push for Indra to acquire defence manufacturer Escribano Mechanical & Engineering, which he and his brother Javier co-owned.
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Dutch insurer Aegon said on Thursday it would move its legal seat to Delaware and proposed a new governance framework as part of a larger effort to move its headquarters to the U.S. and rebrand into Transamerica. The company also said its largest shareholder, Vereniging Aegon, would be renamed Vereniging Aegon Americas and that it would retain its existing ownership position in Aegon, currently at 18.4% on a proforma basis. Proposed key changes include: Phased removal of Aegon’s staggered board structure with annual elections for all directors beginning in 2030; Majority voting in uncontested elections and plurality voting in contested elections; Simplification of the capital structure with the elimination of Common Shares B and Special Cause voting by converting all B-shares held by Vereniging Aegon on a 1:40 basis into a single class of common stock; Authorisation of a new class of preferred stock.
Quebec political parties may not see eye-to-eye about a third referendum on independence, but Prime Minister Mark Carney has given them something they can agree on. In Quebec City on Wednesday, politicians of all stripes denounced Mr. Carney’s comments about what it would take to win a referendum. On Tuesday, the Prime Minister said 50 per cent of votes plus one would not constitute a clear majority in a vote on separation. Those are fighting words in Quebec, where there is broad agreement that a simple majority is enough to declare victory in a sovereignty referendum. While Alberta Premier Danielle Smith’s decision to hold a vote on whether her province should remain in Canada has so far earned a muted response in Quebec, Mr. Carney’s comments have provoked a reaction.
Iran targeted a U.S. air base in Kuwait on Thursday after the United States struck what Washington described as an Iranian drone operation near the Strait of Hormuz and President Donald Trump rejected a reported compromise deal with Tehran. The attacks, while limited, highlighted the fragility of negotiations to turn the tenuous early-April ceasefire into a lasting agreement to end the three-month-old war that has killed thousands, and reopen the vital shipping route. U.S. Central Command said U.S. forces had shot down five Iranian attack drones and struck a ground control station in the port city of Bandar Abbas that was about to launch a sixth. Kuwaiti forces had then intercepted a ballistic missile fired towards the country, which hosts a large U.S. base.
Chinese online retailer Temu has been fined €200 million ($232 million) for not doing enough to stop the sale of illegal products, European Union tech regulators said on Thursday, following the first part of a wide investigation. Further penalties could follow in the coming months as a result of a nearly two-year investigation under the Digital Services Act that requires large online companies to do more to tackle illegal and harmful content on their platforms. EU regulators investigated Temu following complaints by pan-European consumers' organisation BEUC and 17 of its national members. The European Commission, the EU executive, said the company failed to diligently identify, analyse, and assess the systemic risks of illegal products sold on its platform and the resulting harm to consumers in the European Union.
A federal regulator is pushing pause on its review of the blockbuster merger between Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern , imperiling the timetable of their $71.5 billion railroad deal. The Surface Transportation Board on Thursday said it needed more information to “thoroughly evaluate” the two railroads’ revised application for a merger that would create a transcontinental rail giant. “There are several aspects of the revised application that are unclear or underdeveloped and require supplementation,” the board said. The board said it has accepted the application but paused the merger-review proceeding, including an environmental review, and will later establish an appropriate schedule for the remainder of the proceeding.
Synopsys SNPS -3.88%decrease; red down pointing triangle agreed to add Jesse Cohn to its board of directors as part of an agreement with activist investor Elliott Investment Management. Cohn, who is a managing partner at Elliott, will join the board on June 1, the chip-design software company said Wednesday. He will join Synopsys’ corporate governance and nominating committee. Cohn is a member of the management, risk, allocation and investment committees at Elliott. He has served as an independent director at several public technology companies including eBay and Twitter. Synopsys’ board of directors will expand to 11 members with Cohn’s addition. As part of the agreement, Elliott has agreed to customary standstill, voting and confidentiality commitments.
Tyson Foods has tapped board member and former Procter & Gamble sales head Jeff Schomburger to succeed Donnie King as president and chief executive of the meat processor. Tyson on Thursday said Schomburger will take the reins of the Springdale, Ark., company on Oct. 4 following a transition period that will begin in July. King, who has spent more than four decades with Tyson and has been president and CEO since June 2021, will remain a member of the board, the company said.
Canada’s biggest arms expo is booming as an uncertain geopolitical climate and the federal government’s drive to rebuild the military combine to light a fire under the defence tech sector. Hundreds of military equipment companies will jostle to sell their wares this week at CANSEC, an annual event in the nation’s capital that forecasts a 20 to 40 per cent increase in attendance this year. “There’s a belief this government wants to see action on this file and they’re following their ambitions with some actual concrete actions to make things happen,” said Christyn Cianfarani, president of the Canadian Association of Defence and Security Industries, which hosts the show.
A small group of cities across the country drove Canada’s progress on diversifying trade in 2025, while others fell behind, says a new report from the Canadian Chamber of Commerce. The report says Calgary, Ottawa-Gatineau, Toronto, Saskatoon and Kelowna, B.C., are the cities that made the strongest gains in export diversification beyond the U.S. market last year. Of the cities surveyed, Calgary and Ottawa-Gatineau posted the largest increases in exports to non-U.S. markets between 2024 and 2025 – 64.67 per cent and 64.04 per cent, respectively.
The World Health Organization on Saturday, May 17, declared an Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo a Public Health Emergency of International Concern and said there was a high risk it could spread to neighbouring countries. The decision has prompted governments to step up travel-related containment measures. Here is a list of screening steps and travel restrictions announced by different countries.
In front of a packed room of Canadian corporate defence and security leaders, Prime Minister Mark Carney announced that Canada has entered negotiations to procure GlobalEye, an advanced aerial surveillance system developed in Sweden that uses Canadian-made jets. The GlobalEye is an airborne warning and control system (AEW&C) created by Swedish defence and security company Saab. The radar system is integrated into Bombardier’s Global 6500, transforming the corporate jet into a cutting-edge surveillance aircraft. The federal government is negotiating a deal that would see at least one third of the projected fleet of the GlobalEye aircraft manufactured in Canada over the next 15 years.
Dulux owner AkzoNobel has rejected a near €13bn counter-offer from Japan’s Nippon Paint and US group Sherwin-Williams, as the co-bidders attempt to muscle in on an agreed merger between the Dutch group and Axalta. Akzo and Axalta, the New York-listed paint and chemicals group, had announced an all-share merger that would create a group with an enterprise value of $25bn last November, reviving a deal that had been mooted nearly a decade ago. Akzo said the rival offer of €73 a share, which would result in the group being broken up, undervalued the company and that it would forge ahead with the agreed deal.
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