Alison Bond

Cineplex and Cineworld entered into an Arrangement Agreement for Cineworld to acquire Cineplex for $2.8 billion.

Following the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic and mandated theatre closures, Cineplex deferred payments to landlords and suppliers to manage liquidity.

Cineworld terminated the agreement, alleging Cineplex breached the ordinary course covenant.

The court found that Cineplex's cash management measures were commercially reasonable and did not breach the agreement, noting that the pandemic risk was allocated to Cineworld under the Material Adverse Effect clause.

Cineworld's termination was a repudiation, and Cineplex was awarded $1.24 billion in damages for lost synergies and transaction costs.

The joint liquidators of Stanford International Bank (SIB) and a group of investors brought actions against TD Bank, SIB's primary U.S. dollar correspondent bank, for knowing assistance in breach of fiduciary duty and negligence.

The plaintiffs alleged that TD Bank should have detected and prevented the massive Ponzi scheme orchestrated by SIB's owner, Allen Stanford.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the actions, finding that TD Bank had no actual knowledge of the fraud and was not reckless or wilfully blind.

The court also held that TD Bank did not owe a novel duty of care to protect its customer from insider abuse, and even if it did, it met the standard of care of a reasonable banker during the relevant period.

Following a jurisdiction motion where the defendant insurers successfully argued that the court lacked jurisdiction over the proposed class actions, the insurers sought costs of approximately $620,000.

The court found this request preposterous and excessive, fixing costs payable by the plaintiffs to the 13 non-settling insurers at $28,000 on a partial indemnity basis.

The costs payable by the government regulator to the plaintiffs were settled at $12,500.

The plaintiffs filed proposed class actions against 15 auto insurers and the provincial regulator, FSCO, alleging improper deduction of HST from statutory accident benefits.

The defendant insurers brought motions to dismiss the actions for lack of jurisdiction, arguing the Licence Appeal Tribunal (LAT) has exclusive jurisdiction over such disputes.

The court agreed, dismissing the actions against the insurers and refusing to approve two early settlements, as the claims fell squarely within the LAT's exclusive jurisdiction under s. 280 of the Insurance Act.

However, the court found it had jurisdiction to hear the claims against FSCO for regulatory negligence, as those allegations did not directly concern benefit entitlements or amounts.