Ryan Lapensee

The appellant appealed a decision of the Capital Markets Tribunal finding he breached a 15-year trading ban by participating in stock secured financings.

The Tribunal found that the lenders' sales of pledged securities constituted trades, and the appellant's actions, including sourcing financing and analyzing the value of the pledged equities for compensation tied to the sales' profits, were acts in furtherance of those trades.

The Divisional Court dismissed the appeal, holding that the Tribunal made no palpable and overriding error in its contextual analysis of the appellant's conduct.

The appellants appealed a discipline panel's decision finding they engaged in professional misconduct by devising and sending three falsified emails to discredit former employees.

The appellants admitted to sending one email but claimed the other two were sent by a hacker.

The Divisional Court dismissed the appeal, finding the panel correctly applied the burden of proof, reasonably rejected the hacking theory, properly qualified the respondent's digital forensics expert, and appropriately drew an adverse inference against the appellants for failing to produce key evidence.

The court also upheld the panel's penalty and costs awards, noting the sanctions were measured given the fundamental dishonesty involved.

The appellant appealed a decision of the Capital Markets Tribunal finding that he engaged in fraudulent conduct under s. 126.1 of the Securities Act by approving unauthorized transfers of cash between investment funds to pay distributions and dealer fees.

The appellant argued the Panel erred in its factual findings, its rejection of his due diligence and reliance on legal advice defences, and its imposition of sanctions.

The Divisional Court dismissed the appeal, finding no palpable and overriding error in the Panel's factual findings or legal analysis, but reduced the disgorgement order from $51,361 to $45,298 based on a concession by the respondent regarding the calculation methodology.

The proposed intervener, a shareholder of the respondent corporation and leader of an investor group, brought a motion for leave to intervene as an added party in an application concerning the extension of an outside date for a recapitalization transaction.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that the proposed intervener's financial interest in the outcome did not constitute a direct interest in the subject matter of the private commercial dispute.

Furthermore, the court held that the proposed intervener's intended evidence regarding foreign regulatory law would not make a useful contribution to the resolution of the proceeding.