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Wednesday, July 1, 2009 08:23 AM
Dad gets some kudos too: Bill Gates Sr. honoured
Bill Gates's father, William H. Gates Sr., is set to receive the highest honour awarded by the American Bar Association at its annual meeting in Chicago a month from now. The 83-year-old is winning the ABA Medal, not only for his lengthy career in law, but also for his post-retirement activities as a philanthropist and author. Not mentioned by the ABA is perhaps the senior Mr. Gates's greatest gift to the legal profession - son Bill, who, as the driving force of Microsoft, has indirectly provided more work for antitrust practitioners than mega-American corporations such as IBM, AT&T, Kodak and Standard Oil.
The senior Mr. Gates began his career in private practice in Seattle, eventually forming a firm with two partners, now known as K&L Gates, one of the world's largest law firms with 1,900 lawyers in 32 offices. He retired in 1998 after 48 years in practice and now co-chairs the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; he has written two books, including the intriguingly titled Wealth and Our Commonwealth: Why America Should Tax Accumulated Fortunes.
Respect the rules
As Canadian reporters covering high-profile trials in the United States can attest, federal courts there are fanatics about enforcing judge's bans on recording devices in the courtroom. Earlier this week, during the sentencing hearing for Bernard Madoff in New York, District Court Judge Denny Chin came down hard on one Ivy Silberstein for apparently recording the proceedings, in violation of the judge's rules.
Court officers seized the device, made a copy of the recording, and Ms. Silberstein was issued a summons. The judge ordered the device be returned to her after the recording was deleted.
So who is Ivy Silberstein? Dubbed "Poison Ivy" by the New York tabloids, the heavily tattooed party promoter is a member of radio star Howard Stern's "wack pack."
Women on board
Few Canadian female executives sit on foreign boards of directors, but Sheelagh Whittaker is now one of them. She has been appointed a non-executive director at Standard Life PLC, the U.K.-based parent of Standard Life Assurance Co. of Canada, and will join three executive directors and six other non-executive directors.
Her career in Canada has included stints at CBC and Canadian Satellite Communications Inc., and senior executive positions with Electronic Data Systems, and board seats at Imperial Oil and Royal Bank.
Link to this postFriday, July 3, 2009 03:19 AM
Rosedale keeping its clothes on this time
Tonight in the tranquil Toronto enclave of Rosedale, a party without borders is set to unfold.
Now in its fifth year, and with all proceeds going to Serve, an intensive program for at-risk, inner-city youth aged 13 to 24, the event has become known for the great entertainment served up in the fenceless backyards of two Rosedale homes.
In past years, Barenaked Ladies have shown up to perform, along with others, and it was known as Barenaked in Rosedale.
This year the Ladies aren't available and it's been redubbed "Big Night in Rosedale: Fully Clothed." Organizers are promising buyers of the $350 tickets "an intimate jam session with legends of Canadian music" including Carole Pope and Murray McLauchlan, plus newer acts the Arkells and Dala.
One of the hosts, a Toronto money manager we won't name because the event is at his home, tells us that despite corporate sponsorship being tough to come by, organizers hope to raise close to last year's $300,000.
"It's about getting a bunch of people together in a yard to have a good time."
Lunch with Mr. Yang
Earlier this week, we told you about the full-court press to get a large and prestigious turnout for a luncheon on Tuesday for Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi at the Fairmont Château Laurier in Ottawa, hosted by the Canada China Business Council. It worked.
With a main course offering of sunflower-seed-crusted Queen Charlotte Islands sablefish on the table, notable politicians in attendance included Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, Transport Minister John Baird, and Liberal trade critic Scott Brison.
Among the business leaders were André Desmarais, Manulife's new CEO Dan Guloien, and BMO Investments CEO Ed Legzdins. Mr. Yang singled out Bombardier, Manulife and Bank of Montreal for praise for their commitment to China.
In turn, he received a warm standing ovation for his frank and at times humorous speech.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009 05:14 AM
An 'urgent' call from China
The Canada China Business Council put out an urgent request last week to Canadian business leaders to show up in force for a luncheon today in Ottawa for visiting Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi. The two-day visit is described as "sudden" - it was announced in China last Friday that Mr. Yang would make the stop on his way to a UN conference on the global economic crisis in New York later this week.
The June 15 e-mail from CCBC president Peter Harder, labelled "urgent," makes it clear this "is a call to action to Canada's most senior business leaders to be present and visible at this very important event. Our honorary chair, Mr.André Desmarais, will be present, and we expect excellent representation from Canada's senior executives."
Mr. Harder stresses the significance of the luncheon, which he says was requested by the Chinese government. "It will be a wonderful opportunity to showcase your company's support for the re-energizing of the Canada-China relationship over the past few months."
Recent trips to Beijing by Canadian Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon and International Trade Minister Stockwell Day were deemed successful efforts to improve bilateral relations. Last month, Ottawa appointed our new ambassador to China, David Mulroney, a former head of the CCBC.
Corporate leaders from Bombardier, Manulife, Bank of Montreal, Research In Motion and Sun Life Financial are expected to turn out for the luncheon. The CCBC is also inviting senior politicians and the premiers who joined the council's trip to China last November.
Who's responsible
Toby Heaps, president and editor of Corporate Knights magazine, which was distributed in The Globe and Mail yesterday, is having a noisy dispute with Maclean's publisher and editor-in-chief Ken Whyte about a ranking of the 50 best corporate citizens in Canada. Corporate Knights is in its eighth year of publishing an annual ranking of firms with the best social responsibility; its "Best 50 Corporate Citizens in Canada" issue, a signature feature. But in its June 22 issue, Maclean's touted an "exclusive report" of "Canada's 50 best corporate citizens."
Mr. Heaps says Mr. Whyte is poaching his idea. "While we welcome newcomers to the corporate responsibility realm, it's unfortunate that Maclean's seems to have taken a run at our market share by using a trademark that is ... confusing with our distinctive trademark," Mr. Heaps said last week. He challenged Mr. Whyte to a public debate about how to evaluate good corporate citizens. Doesn't look like it's in the cards, however.
"We're not interested in a debate," Mr. Whyte told us. "They're welcome to make as much noise as they want but we're not going to play."
Saturday, June 20, 2009 03:49 AM
Flaherty a big fan of a new think tank
Tomorrow night, the country's Finance Minister, Jim Flaherty, will host a private dinner at the Albany Club in Toronto to raise support for a new, non-partisan, private sector think tank. Called the Macdonald-Laurier Institute and designed to be national in scope but based in Ottawa, it is the creation of Brian Lee Crowley, currently president of the Atlantic Institute for Market Studies in Halifax.
Mr. Flaherty is "giving it my personal backing," he says in a letter inviting well-heeled Bay Street types to the event "and I hope that you will consider doing the same."
Having spent several years in the capital, the minister says "I can speak with some authority when I say that driving change within Ottawa is not easy. There are powerful actors in Ottawa, within the civil service, Parliament, the media and in many non-governmental organizations, that actively resist progress. ... Although I have always felt very well supported by friends and colleagues, I have clearly felt the need for independent research, support and promotion of these ideals," which he enumerates as smaller government, lower taxes and greater personal responsibility.
Mr. Flaherty continues: "That is why I strongly support Brian Crowley's project to create a national, non-partisan public policy think tank in Ottawa."
Yesterday, a spokesman for the minister said of the endorsement: "I doubt if he does it a lot."
Mr. Crowley told Nobody's Business yesterday that he hopes to launch in the fall and has already raised $1-million, adding: "Other Western countries have their most important and influential think tanks always in the national capital. Canada is really an anomaly and I think that's a big hole in our democratic infrastructure."
Mr. Flaherty came to know Mr. Crowley when the latter spent a year and a half attached to the Department of Finance as a visiting economist.
The minister concludes his pitch to potential backers of the new think tank by saying: "I'd like to see him return with a strong, independent and well-financed organization behind him to help transform Ottawa for the better, regardless of who is in power. This important national initiative deserves to succeed. Please join me in ensuring that it does. My office will follow up with you."
Wednesday, June 17, 2009 07:38 AM
The birth of a deluxe food shop
Celebrity chef Mark McEwen (Bymark, One, North 44, plus his Food Network show) is finally set to open his gourmet supermarket tomorrow, and with that the food-shopping habits of Toronto’s upper crust will certainly be shaken up.
High-priced grocers such as Pusateri’s and Whole Foods, along with the food boutiques near Rosedale and Forest Hill, can expect some recession-friendly competition.
The store, called McEwen, was slated to open last January, so it’s a bit behind schedule. It’s located in a new, bravely open-air luxe mall called the Shops at Don Mills, which is still in the midst of becoming fully tenanted.
We hear that recently Mr. McEwen has been giving sneak peaks of his store to friends, family and foodies.
“The attention to detail is phenomenal,” says someone who has seen it. “It’s remarkable.”
One detail that will get critics of bourgeois Toronto going: The small grocery carts have built-in holders for latte cups.
Mr. McEwen’s aim is to offer a full-service, one-stop store for the best of everything food-wise, from artisan cheeses to a great hot dog with yellow mustard.
That’s not where his ambition stops: Apparently, he now has plans to open five such stores in the city.
We asked him about that when we caught up with him earlier this week at the store.
“It’s like male childbirth,” he said. “Once I’ve forgotten the pain, I’ll want to do it again.”
Wednesday, June 17, 2009 07:39 AM
Optionable suit dismissible
A putative class-action lawsuit against Optionable Inc. looks like it has run out of gas after a judge in a U.S. District Court turned down the plaintiffs’ request that the case be reopened and refiled.
Optionable Inc. was the New York-area brokerage that Bank of Montreal stopped using after it lost hundreds of millions of dollars on natural gas trades.
The proposed class-action suit was launched by KLD Investment Management LLC on behalf of Optionable shareholders, and it named as defendants the brokerage and a handful of executives and directors who worked there between Jan. 22 and May 14, 2007, a period in which its stock plunged.
Previously, a judge in the Southern District of New York dismissed the suit, saying the documents submitted to him had not sufficiently laid out the allegations, but left the door open for the plaintiffs to amend and resubmit their claim.
Monday, June 15, 2009 03:39 AM
Duchesne's ready to ride
Rupert Duchesne, CEO of Aeroplan, may be in the business of frequent-flier points but he excels at spoked-wheel transport. In this weekend's Ride to Conquer Cancer, a 200-kilometre, two-day bike ride from Toronto to Niagara Falls, Mr. Duchesne will be part of an elite team of more than 50 riders led by Lawrence Zimmering, founder of Resolve Corp., and Olympic medalist Steve Bauer.
About 4,000 riders will participate in the fundraiser for cancer research at Toronto's Princess Margaret Hospital. This is year two for the event, which raised a phenomenal $14-million in 2008. Mr. Duchesne personally raised $52,350 last year, in the halcyon days prerecession; currently he's at the $30,000 mark. "But I will carry on poking people right up until the ride."
Last year, he says, some of his team members were still getting donations on their BlackBerrys during the ride. The team finished in top place money-wise at $469,000, and is currently in second spot. The team members have been meeting every Saturday in Oakville, Ont., to train, riding 75 km. Mr. Duchesne describes that as a "fun experience." Uh huh. But then he has extra motivation; his sixtysomething father-in-law is also on the team and rides 50 km to work and back. "It's a huge incentive not to do worse than he does," Mr. Duchesne says with a laugh.
All is forgiven
Allen Palmiere, who was ousted as the CEO of HudBay Minerals in a nasty proxy battle a few months back, isn't holding a grudge. Mr. Palmiere attended a mining conference in Toronto this week, taking in a presentation by his former adversary and successor at HudBay, Peter Jones. In early 2008, when he was HudBay's chairman, Mr. Palmiere was among a group of directors who forced Mr. Jones from the top job at the zinc-and-copper miner. But it was Mr. Jones who had the last laugh. Backed by a foreign hedge fund during a bitter proxy contest, Mr. Jones won back his old job in March along with a new slate of directors. Mr. Palmiere seemed in good spirits at the mining confab Tuesday. He took the time to approach Mr. Jones and shake his hand after the presentation. The body language wasn't exactly warm and fuzzy, but the former adversaries shared a brief, and, by all appearances, extremely civil conversation.
Saturday, June 13, 2009 03:56 AM
Hearn's lump sum was quite an imperial payout
It seems former Imperial Oil chief executive officer Tim Hearn is doing okay in retirement. The company's proxy circular, which was filed three months ago, has an interesting morsel buried in a footnote on page 31. It seems Mr. Hearn, who left at the end of March, 2008, took a lump-sum pension payout from the company, thus it does not appear on the document's main compensation chart. Imperial Oil executives can choose to receive their pension payments as a monthly annuity or as a lump sum. But because Mr. Hearn chose to take a lump sum, Imperial Oil cut a cheque for $23.586-million. Mr. Hearn also holds 618,200 share units, which are eligible for exercise as late as 2011, depending on the date they were granted. At year-end, Mr. Hearn's were worth $25.34-million.
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
TD Bank commissioned a poll whose results shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. In a news release from TD entitled R-E-S-P-E-C-T, the bank trumpeted a poll it commissioned from Angus Reid on customer loyalty. "Customers want companies to respect them and stand by them in tough times," the poll concluded. In other words, the bank paid money to find out that customers prefer to be treated properly. No kidding. The survey says respect is as important as knowledge in defining good bank service. In fact, bank customers rated being treated well above receiving freebies, discounts and gift certificates.
Report on Business Company Snapshot is available for:IMPERIAL OIL LIMITED
Saturday, June 20, 2009 03:52 AM
Mansion on the move
Toronto homeowners take heart. Word comes to us from the rarefied region of the Bridle Path that prestige mansions are selling again. Case in point: Russian-born billionaire Alex Shnaider's Old Colony Road grand residence reportedly just sold for $8.6-million. We hear that the globe-trotting Mr. Shnaider has built a new home elsewhere in the Bridle Path for himself and his family, so he's not leaving town. Mr. Shnaider, of course, is chairman of Talon International (he also has steel, sports and shipping interests), the company behind the $500-million, 57-floor Trump International Hotel & Tower being built in the downtown financial district.
LIFE OF THE PARTY
Last week we told you about Michael Cooper's post-presidential conversation party at his home in the Annex area of Toronto. We speak here of the public speaking event last Friday afternoon headlined by two former U.S. presidents, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. Mr. Cooper is CEO of Dundee REIT and a friend of Mr. Clinton. The soirée began about 5:30 p.m. or so, and outside on Admiral Road, there was an enterprising kid with a lemonade stand. Too much to resist for an old photo-op hand like Mr. Clinton, it seems. He exited his limo and immediately wandered over to sample the wares. Soon he was surrounded by kids and their yummy mummies quaffing lemonade, chatting and snapping cellphone pics. Vintage Clinton.
FICKLE FANS
New York's investment community wasn't shy about asking executives from Rogers Communications Inc. if they were going to join the pursuit for the Montreal Canadiens. Rob Bruce, head of wireless at Rogers, had just finished his presentation to attendees of a Barclays Capital conference one day last week when one of the first questions from the audience honed in on the company's hockey plans. The cable and wireless giant already owns the Toronto Blue Jays and the baseball team's home venue, the Rogers Centre. Would it like a piece of the Habs? "We're quite happy with the mix of sports in our franchise," Mr. Bruce replied. "But there are definitely people in our office who would love to buy the Canadiens because they are so sick of watching the Toronto Maple Leafs lose."
Monday, June 8, 2009 03:53 AM
A higher plane for friendship
Vancouver-based mining mogul Frank Giustra has an air ride with gold-plated fixtures in the shower-equipped bathroom, leather upholstered reclining seats, flat-panel TVs and original art on the walls. The name of Mr. Giustra's MD-87 jet? "Giustra Air," reads the logo on the blankets. These details come by way of last Sunday's article in The New York Times Magazine, by Peter Baker, about the "mellowing" of former U.S. president Bill Clinton.
In it, Mr. Giustra, who has donated $100-million (U.S.) to Mr. Clinton's sustainable development initiative, is seen accompanying the former leader to Colombia on Clinton Foundation business. Or rather, Mr. Clinton accompanies Mr. Giustra, as the mogul provides the luxury transport. The two continue to enjoy a close friendship, having weathered some adverse publicity a couple of years ago involving a uranium mining deal for Mr. Giustra in Kazakhstan that coincided with a visit by Mr. Clinton to that country. The magazine article depicts Mr. Clinton, at one point, shopping for a gift for Mr. Giustra's girlfriend; at another, the late-night live wire has Mr. Giustra playing a card game (known as Oh Hell) taught to him by Steven Spielberg.
MANULIFE'S OPEN-DOOR POLICY
Veteran business author and journalist Rod McQueen has churned out many a tome on Canadian corporate life. His latest book, Manulife, is about the insurance company and its recently retired CEO, Dominic D'Alessandro. The book was launched at the Toronto Club earlier this week at an event hosted by the author's son, Mark McQueen, CEO of Wellington Financial. The book is not a paid biography, but it's no unauthorized scandal sheet à la Kitty Kelley, either. The author says Mr. D'Alessandro was "very generous" with his time and sent a note to Manulife directors and executives urging them to co-operate with interviews. "Nobody I phoned turned me down," Mr. McQueen says.
On his website(rodmcqueen.com) the author offers robust opinions about the company and its federal regulator. "Manulife's dilemma was never financial, it was accounting," he writes on his blog regarding the company's forced raising of capital after the global financial meltdown. "Regulators demanded the company put up an additional $11-billion in capital because 250,000 out of 20 million clients had variable annuities. It was a crazy demand at the time ..." It caused the company's share price to plummet and subjected Mr. D'Alessandro to harsh assessments in the last months of his illustrious 13-year reign as CEO.
"Canadian regulators haven't done much. It's more good luck than good management," Mr. McQueen told us yesterday.
Nobody's Business Contributors
Patricia Best
Patricia Best tells tales from the Canadian business world. Everything from minor scandals to outsized personalities to amusing foibles are fodder for her column, Nobody’s Business—even the occasional good deed. She has written on business for Canadian, U.S. and British magazines and newspapers, is a former editor of Report on Business Magazine and is the author of three books, including one on the inevitability of a major financial panic entitled Fear, Greed and the End of the Rainbow.