Financial Institutions and Financial Services Law

Financial services are provided in a highly regulated and competitive environment known for complex and constantly evolving dynamics and issues, including an ever-changing legal framework, compliance risks, and challenges caused by the fast pace of technological innovation.

Our commitment is to provide you with strategic legal advice and proactive representation. Leveraging extensive subject matter expertise, we guide you through the intricacies of legislation and financial regulations, anticipate potential risks, and seize emerging opportunities to support your success, both preventively and in litigation. You can fully harness coordinated services in every area of financial services law, spanning technology, business law, taxation, insolvency, real estate and litigation.

Financial institution regulations

Regulatory compliance is a critical consideration for business success in the financial services industry. Yet complying with provincial and federal regulations can be complex owing to the technicalities of the regulatory framework governing financial institutions, and the myriad of regulators and self-regulatory organizations.

Our Financial Institutions and Financial Services Law team has a full range of expertise to serve financial institutions, issuers and distributors of financial products and services, insurers, mutual fund dealers, investment dealers, professional liability insurance funds, investment fund managers, portfolio managers in compliance matters, as well as self-regulatory organizations. We leverage our in-depth knowledge of the regulatory framework governing financial services to support you and meet your needs in Quebec and across Canada.

We regularly work on cases involving the main regulatory bodies:

• Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF)
• Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions (OSFI)
• Office of the Superintendent of Bankruptcy (OSB)
• Chambre de la sécurité financière (CSF)
• Chambre de l’assurance de dommages (ChAD)
• Canadian Investment Regulatory Organization (CIRO)
• Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada (IIROC)

We implement multidisciplinary approaches to address:

• Legal issues relating to business and regulatory transactions of all kinds
• Issuing regulatory capital, covered bonds and securities
• M&A transactions
• Investments by foreign institutions in Canadian entities
• Commercial agreements
• Compliance with Canadian legislation governing financial institutions
• Anti-money laundering
• Corporate governance tailored to financial institutions
• Competition and antitrust cases
• Personal information protection and artificial intelligence

Our team’s best-in-class regulatory compliance and governance expertise includes:

• Implementing compliance programs
• Rolling out mandatory guidelines to comply with the full spectrum of regulatory requirements
• Regulatory inquiries and investigations conducted by the various regulators

Banking Litigation

Our Banking Litigation team has specialist experience in regulatory and compliance issues, securities, mutual funds, financing and capital procurement, and commercial and consumer law. We have acquired a thorough understanding of the legislative and regulatory frameworks governing banking and financial institutions and in-depth banking and commercial litigation expertise in the financial services sector.

We can represent financial institutions as plaintiffs or defendants in a broad range of litigation, including:

• Claims based on alleged fraud schemes including cheque, ATM, pre-authorized debit, wire transfer, credit card and CEO fraud
• Support in obtaining or handling orders and injunctions such as Norwich and Anton Piller orders and Mareva injunctions and seizures before judgment aimed at recovering assets following a fraudulent event
• Enforcing security interests and hypothecs and exercising hypothecary remedies
• Defence in letter of credit litigation
• Contesting payments, asset disposals and fraudulent transactions
• Defence in class actions