CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

Bribery case snares man who held Trafigura’s secrets and purse strings

Bloomberg News | December 8, 2023 | 

Image: Trafigura

For years, one of the most powerful people in commodity trading has been a quietly spoken English accountant who is barely known outside his own company. But this week, Trafigura Group’s Mike Wainwright was thrust into the spotlight after being charged by Switzerland’s top prosecutor for allegedly bribing an Angolan government official.


Wainwright, who has spent his whole career at Trafigura and was a protégé of charismatic founder Claude Dauphin, might be the most senior commodity trader ever to be charged with corruption. Despite the industry’s reputation for brown envelopes and backhanders that goes back to the days of Marc Rich, very few of the most senior figures have ever faced prosecution.


If found guilty he’ll face up to five years in prison. He denies the charges.

An avid motor racer, Wainwright, 50, has avoided the public profile of some of the company’s top traders. But people who have worked with him at Trafigura say he has for decades been a hugely powerful figure — and one of the largest shareholders — at the company that ranks as one of the world’s biggest commodity traders.

The Swiss case against Wainwright and Trafigura highlights the growing desire of prosecutors to hold the industry’s top figures accountable for alleged corruption in a sprawling set of cases that have entwined most of the biggest traders. In the UK, prosecutors say they are weighing charges against up to eleven former Glencore Plc traders and executives after the company admitted to charges of paying numerous bribes over a period of years in multiple countries.

For Trafigura, the case coincides with the start of a generational shift in leadership. Wainwright, who held the title chief operating officer from 2008 until earlier this year, had already announced plans to retire next year. He is now on a leave of absence, although he remains an employee.

Both Trafigura and Wainwright intend to defend themselves against the Swiss allegations in court, the company said on Wednesday. A lawyer for Wainwright said he denied having “made, instructed or authorized payments with a corrupt intent.”

In recent years, while prosecutors in the US, UK, Switzerland and Brazil have brought a wave of corruption cases against large commodity trading houses, only a few mid-level traders have been charged with wrongdoing as individuals. Marc Rich freely admitted to having paid bribes in his heyday, but that was in an era of laxer laws on bribery — especially in Switzerland where many traders are based. The oil-for-food scandal involving kickbacks paid to Saddam Hussein’s Iraq in the early 2000s led to several prosecutions of individual traders, largely in the US, but not of the leaders of the world’s largest trading houses.

“We are revisiting the past with today’s eyes,” said Jean-Francois Lambert, a consultant and former banker to the commodity trading industry. “The outcome will be painful for trading houses.”
Employee 41

At Trafigura, Wainwright was formally responsible for the unglamorous side of commodity trading: the teams of logistics specialists and bookkeepers who work in the background to keep track of a company’s trades.

But his role was much more than that. He joined the company in February 1996, just a few years after it was founded by a group of disaffected former Marc Rich + Co. employees. Wainwright was employee number 41, and started as an accountant.

Over time, he became a favorite of founder Dauphin, who valued him for his loyalty and trusted him without question, say several people who worked with both men.

Wainwright was one of the only people inside Trafigura other than Dauphin who knew the ownership stake of each employee in the company, a privately-held partnership where each year employee-shareholders wait with baited breath to discover how many shares they have been allotted.

One former board member recalls how Dauphin and Wainwright would discuss the shareholding breakdown between themselves before presenting it to the rest of the management board as a fait accompli.

In a sign of his significance, it was Wainwright, along with chief executive Jeremy Weir and longtime head of oil trading Jose Larocca, who Dauphin chose to shepherd the company after his death in 2015. For years, Trafigura’s chief financial officer did not have a seat on the company’s board; but Wainwright, its chief operating officer, did.


The individual shareholdings of Trafigura executives are a closely guarded secret, but numerous current and former employees say that Wainwright is one of the company’s largest shareholders.

On Friday, the massive wealth generated by Trafigura for its top executives was underscored when the company said it paid $5.9 billion of dividends to its roughly 1,200 employee shareholders, after notching up another record annual profit.

While Wainwright has maintained a far lower profile outside of the company than Weir or Larocca, he received a rare moment of publicity when he bought a villa on Lake Geneva for just shy of 50 million francs ($57 million). And the wealth he has generated over the years at Trafigura has helped fund his passion for motor racing — he owns an endurance driving team and has competed in amateur versions of the famed Le Mans 24-hour race.
Personally approved

Wainwright is known inside Trafigura for his focus on numbers rather than relationships — almost a mirror image of his mentor, Dauphin, who relished striking friendships with business leaders and politicians and pursued new deals with a passion that sometimes obscured their dubious commercial logic.

He personally approved even relatively small expenditures – such as a subscription to an industry newsletter – making him unpopular among some in Trafigura’s ranks who bridled at having their spending pored over.

That oversight has also made him a target for prosecutors pursuing Trafigura’s alleged historical corruption. When Brazilian prosecutors accused Trafigura of corruption as part of the sprawling “Car Wash” probe in a civil case in 2020, Wainwright was named as a defendant. Prosecutors showed emails in which he approved payments – providing five-digit reference numbers for Trafigura’s books – that they say were used to bribe Petrobras officials.

A spokesperson said that Trafigura was not aware of any evidence that Wainwright or anyone in its current management had “authorized or had knowledge of improper payments to employees of Petrobras.”

And in Angola, Swiss prosecutors allege, Wainwright approved bank transfers and cash payments totaling around $5 million to the head of a unit of state oil company Sonangol.

Trafigura said it had been willing to settle the Swiss investigation out of court, but that now it would defend itself in court.

Still, Trafigura in a statement this week acknowledged past wrongdoing.

“We sincerely regret these incidents which breached our code of conduct and are contrary to our values,” CEO Weir said in the statement. “Our compliance policies and procedures have been externally reviewed and found to meet relevant legal requirements and international good practice standards. These historical incidents in no way represent the company we are today.” The company said it was close to a settlement with the US Department of Justice in relation to “improper payments” in Brazil.

In other trading companies, a settlement with US prosecutors has heralded a generational shift in management. For example, almost all of the top tier of Glencore’s management retired in the years leading up to the company’s settlement with the DOJ.

For Trafigura’s leadership, the charges come at a sensitive time, as the company is still dealing with the fallout after falling victim to a massive alleged nickel fraud. It also recently announced a reorganization of its top management, although Weir and Larocca remain its two most senior executives.

Trafigura does not expect any changes in its senior management as part of the settlement process, the company said in a response to questions on Thursday.

(By Jack Farchy and Archie Hunter)

Trafigura targeted by US and Swiss over corruption
Bloomberg News | December 6, 2023 | 

Trafigura office in Geneva, Switzerland. Credit: Trafigura

Trafigura Group and one of its longstanding top executives have been charged over allegations of bribing public officials in Angola, in a major blow to one of the world’s largest commodity traders.


Trafigura acknowledged the Swiss charges in a statement, and also revealed for the first time a US Department of Justice investigation into “improper payments” made in Brazil.

The charges are the latest in a series of actions from global prosecutors targeting corruption in the commodity trading industry, and the most serious so far against Trafigura, a leading oil and metals trader.

The charges against Mike Wainwright, who as Trafigura’s chief operating officer has for a decade formed part of the top trio running the company, make him the one of the most senior commodity traders ever to be charged for corruption.

Trafigura’s top competitors Glencore Plc and Vitol Group have in recent years both agreed to pay fines to settle wide-ranging US investigations into corruption, but until now only a few, largely mid-level individuals have been charged in those cases.

The energy crisis over the past two years has raised the profile of companies like Trafigura, Glencore and Vitol in global capitals, as politicians realize they are reliant on commodity traders to secure supplies of essential resources. But it has also heightened scrutiny of an industry that has since the days of Marc Rich had a reputation for corruption and wrongdoing.

For Trafigura, the charges follow a series of setbacks that have pressured its leadership and fueled tensions among the senior ranks — including having fallen victim to a massive alleged nickel fraud. The group, which is preparing to report results for its latest financial year, recently reorganized its top management and has been wrestling with the future of its metals business. Still, the company continues to reap huge profits from its energy divisions.
Cash payments

In a statement Wednesday, the Swiss federal prosecutor’s office said that Trafigura, through its unit Trafigura Beheer BV, failed to take necessary organizational measures to prevent the payment of bribes in Angola between 2009 and 2011.

The trading house paid €4.3 million euros ($4.6 million) to a bank account in Geneva and made cash payments of $604,000 to an Angolan official between April 2009 and October 2011 in relation to its activities in the country’s petroleum industry, the prosecutor said in the statement. It also paid hotel and meal expenses of 797 Swiss francs ($911) for a stay in Geneva.

In return, the Angolan official, the former chief executive officer of a subsidiary of the state oil company Sonangol, favored Trafigura in shipping contracts, the Swiss prosecutor alleges. Trafigura’s alleged profits from those contracts amount to $143.7 million.

Under Swiss law, Trafigura faces penalties equivalent to the total illicit profit plus a fine of up to 5 million francs — or around $150 million in total. That compares to net profits of $5.5 billion reported by Trafigura in its latest half year accounts.

Trafigura said it expects to resolve the DOJ case “shortly” and has made a $127 million provision in its 2023 financial year accounts.

It said that the investigations related in part to statements made by former Trafigura executive Mariano Ferraz as part of a plea agreement following his conviction in a separate case in Brazil. Ferraz was charged with corruption and money laundering as part of the Petrobras Carwash probe, while Trafigura and several of its senior executives have been accused of corruption by Brazilian prosecutors in a civil lawsuit.
Court defense

Trafigura said it had been willing to settle the Swiss investigation out of court, but that now it would defend itself in court. It said Wainwright rejects the Swiss charges and will be mounting a court defense.

“We sincerely regret these incidents which breached our code of conduct and are contrary to our values,” Trafigura CEO Jeremy Weir said in the statement. “Our compliance policies and procedures have been externally reviewed and found to meet relevant legal requirements and international good practice standards. These historical incidents in no way represent the company we are today.”

If Wainwright is found guilty, he faces a potential fine or a maximum of five years in prison. Trafigura earlier this year announced his planned retirement in March 2024, but he has now handed over his responsibilities and is on a leave of absence to focus on his defense, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The Swiss attorney general’s office stressed in today’s statement that this is the first time that a case against a company for alleged bribery of public officials has ever been sent to the country’s top criminal court.

Swiss indictments of companies are rare and convictions even rarer. The last major Swiss company to be convicted of a crime was Credit Suisse Group AG for failing to prevent money laundering. It was one of a series of scandals that befell the bank, which collapsed, and was bought by UBS Group AG less than a year later.

(By Jack Farchy and Archie Hunter)

Antofagasta, union begin mediation to avoid strike
Reuters | December 5, 2023 | 9:56 am Top Companies Latin America Copper

Centinela operation in northern Chile. (Image courtesy of Antofagasta)

Chilean copper mining company Antofagasta and workers at its Centinela mine on Tuesday began a government mediation process after contract talks failed, a last resort before the union could go on strike.


The nearly 400 employees represented by a Centinela workers union last month overwhelmingly rejected a contract proposal from Antofagasta, causing the company to request mediation from the Chilean government


The union is looking to make up for lower production-linked bonuses and to improve working conditions, according to union leader Luis Redlich.

“This process is a double play, making talks very complex and making people willing to go as far as it takes and begin a strike if necessary,” Redlich said, adding that the union was “always willing to talk.”

The mediation process will last for five days, but can be extended another five if both parties agree.

Antofagasta declined to comment on the negotiations but said that “dialogue with our unions is the way to reach agreements.”

The miner was set to invest $3.7 billion at Centinela, but CEO Ivan Arriagada said in June the company was re-evaluating the expense after Chile’s government upped mining royalties.

“(Copper) price estimates are high, and they’re going to stay that way,” Redlich said. “Investments are going to go the same way. They have to make a decision this year, but that has to go hand-in-hand with agreements made with workers.”

In 2022, Centinela produced 247,600 metric tons of copper, according to data from the state agency Cochilco.

(By Fabian Cambero and Kylie Madry; Editing by Will Dunham)

 

Panama formally orders First Quantum to shut down flagship copper mine

Jacob Lorinc and Michael McDonald, Bloomberg News

Panama’s government formally ordered First Quantum Minerals Ltd. to end all operations at its US$10-billion copper mine in the country, according to the Canadian company’s local unit.

Panama’s Ministry of Commerce and Industry ordered the metals producer to “end extraction, processing, refining, transportation, export and sales activities,” the company said in a Friday statement. The move follows a Supreme Court ruling that invalidated the law governing Cobre Panama’s operating license.

The giant Cobre Panama mine has been at the center of widespread protests that erupted over a decision to approve a new multidecade operating contract in October. President Laurentino Cortizo initiated plans to shutter the mine in November.

First Quantum is also requesting permission from Panama’s labour ministry to lay off more than 4,000 of the 7,000 employees at the site “for justified economic reasons.” Some will remain on site to “maintain the safety of the facilities and avoid environmental losses or damages within the mining area,” the company said.

Shares of the Vancouver-based firm fell as much as 2.1 per cent in Toronto, touching its lowest intraday price since June 2020.

Panama government orders First Quantum

 to end copper operations

Staff Writer | December 8, 2023 

Cobre Panamá operation. (Image by Minera Panama.)

Panama’s trade and industry ministry has ordered First Quantum (TSX: FM) to end operations at its Cobre Panama copper mine, according to the company.


The ministry sent Cobre Panama a formal advisory that it must “end extraction, processing, refining, transportation, export and sales activities” at the mine.

The government order comes after Panama’s Supreme Court ruled last month that First Quantum’s contract to operate the mine was unconstitutional, following months of protests.

Cobre Panama, in production since 2019, generated 112,734 tonnes of copper in the third quarter of 2023, contributing $930 million to First Quantum’s overall third-quarter revenue of $2.02 billion.

The mine accounts for about 5% of Panama’s gross domestic product and makes up 75% of its export of goods.

Because it must close the mine, Cobre Panama said it has requested government authorization to lay off more than 4,000 of its employees. Last month, the miner suspended the contracts of 7,000 staff at the mine.

First Quantum said last week it had initiated international arbitration procedures to protect its rights under the 2023 concession agreement that the government of Panama agreed to earlier this year, as well as the Canada-Panama free trade agreement.

(With files from Reuters)

Apple’s iPhone and watch product design chief to leave in shake-up

Mark Gurman, Bloomberg 

The Apple Inc. executive in charge of product design for the iPhone and smartwatch is stepping down, bringing a shake-up to the company’s most critical product lines.

Tang Tan, whose title is vice president of product design, is leaving in February, according to people with knowledge of the matter, who asked not to be identified because the move isn’t public. Tan reports to John Ternus, senior vice president of hardware engineering, and the division is reshuffling duties to handle the transition.

Several deputies to Ternus and Tan are getting expanded roles as part of the changes. That includes Richard Dinh, Tan’s top lieutenant and head of iPhone product design. Dinh is being elevated to report directly to Ternus. Kate Bergeron, a hardware engineering executive responsible for Mac teams, is taking over the design of the Apple Watch.

Apple didn’t respond to a request for comment on the changes.

The iPhone and Apple Watch are central to Apple’s operations, accounting for well over half of the tech giant’s US$383.3 billion in revenue last year. Tan also was responsible for the design of accessories and oversaw the company’s acoustics team, which handles much of the development of the AirPods. Those two groups are being relocated under Matthew Costello, who is in charge of Beats and the HomePod smart speaker.

People familiar with Apple’s operations say the Tan departure is a blow, and that he made critical decisions about Apple’s most important products. Beyond the iPhone, his work on the Watch and AirPods helped turn those devices into major growth drivers for the Cupertino, California-based company.

Under Apple’s organizational structure, the product design team works closely with its industrial design and operations groups. Tan’s team has tight control over product features, including the look of devices and how they’re engineered.

Tan is the second senior executive to announce departure plans recently. Bloomberg News reported earlier this week that Steve Hotelling — a vice president in charge of hardware technologies like Touch ID, Face ID and displays — is retiring. Hotelling reported to Johny Srouji, senior vice president of hardware technologies.

It’s also at least the third exit in a year from Ternus’ organization. Yannick Bertolus, who was once in charge of hardware product quality and later ran hardware product management, recently retired. His predecessor in the latter role, Laura Legros, left at the end of last year.

Ternus, who took charge of hardware engineering in 2021, recently shuffled other parts of the organization. He elevated Dan West — formerly the No. 2 executive for hardware quality — to a new non-product role reporting to him. Other executives in charge of Mac product design and iPhone hardware systems were also promoted, suggesting that Apple could be preparing for more leadership changes in the coming year.

RENT STRIKE TENANTS UNION

Renters at disadvantage amid high interest rates: experts

Iva Poshnjari and Holly McKenzie-Sutter, BNN Bloomberg

Dec 6, 2023

The Bank of Canada’s decision to hold interest rates at five per cent will likely keep the country’s real estate market on pause, but tenants – particularly those in non-rent controlled buildings – are at a disadvantage amid high costs, experts say.

Tenants have felt the brunt of rising rent costs as landlords respond to higher interest rates and related rising mortgage costs.

Canada’s central bank elected to hold rates at five per cent again on Wednesday, and noted the upward pressure on housing costs related to its historic hiking cycle in its statement on the rate decision.

The Bank of Canada said the economy is slowing down and reducing inflation on some goods and services, but pointed to housing as an outlier.

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“Shelter price inflation has picked up, reflecting faster growth in rent and other housing costs along with the continued contribution from elevated mortgage interest costs,” the central bank’s official statement read.

TENANTS SHOULD CONSIDER RENT CONTROL: REALTOR

Wednesday’s central bank decision to keep rates on pause should keep the market steady, said Nicki Skinner, realtor at Bosley Real Estate. But she cautioned that tenants might be susceptible to further rent increases, depending on the details of their rental agreement.

“Steady rates are good news for landlords and tenants, but it really depends on if the property is rent controlled,” Skinner told BNNBloomberg.ca in a phone interview.

In Ontario, landlords can only raise rents to a maximum of 2.5 per cent each year for rent-controlled properties. But that limit doesn’t apply to tenants in buildings that began housing tenants after Nov. 15, 2018, or if a new tenant is moving into a unit.

“An extended period of interest rates at these levels could cause some landlords to hike rents if they are feeling the financial pressure,” Skinner said.

She recommended that tenants find out if a unit is rent controlled if they are looking to move in a high-rate environment.

‘NOT GREAT’ FOR RENTERS

Another housing expert noted that Canadian renters face a bleak picture when it comes to overall affordability.

“The situation is still not great for renters,” Victor Tran, mortgage and real estate expert with RATESDOTCA, told BNNBloomberg.ca in a written statement.

Real estate investors facing higher mortgage rates are likely to keep passing those extra costs onto their tenants, Tran explained. He also highlighted a lack of rental supply in the market and that is putting pressure on costs in housing a market that was already pricey to begin with. 

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“Even before the overnight rate began to rise, rents were expensive,” he said. “It’s unlikely that renters will see relief from high rental costs anytime soon.”

 

Survey finds Canadian firms plan to hire in 2024

Jordan Fleguel, BNN Bloomberg

Slowing economic activity has cooled Canada’s labour market in recent months, but new survey data suggests there will be plenty of hiring by Canadian companies in 2024.

A November survey by human resources firm Robert Half found that 54 per cent of Canadian companies plan to add new permanent roles in the first half of next year.

Another 40 per cent of surveyed companies said they anticipate hiring for vacated positions, while 68 per cent expect to hire more contract workers, according to the survey results published this week.

Among those companies that plan to expand their hiring in 2024, 61 per cent said they’re doing so to grow the company, 50 per cent said their current employees lack requisite skills and 48 per cent said they intend to capitalize on talent laid off from other firms.

Robert Half’s survey also found that almost 80 per cent of firms that put projects on hold in 2023 plan to pick that work up again next year.

The survey data comes less than a week after Statistics Canada released its November labour force survey, which found the unemployment rate rose to 5.8 per cent last month. 

Canada’s economy added a modest 25,000 jobs, slightly surpassing forecasters' expectations but trailing behind the pace of population growth. 

HIRING CHALLENGES

Despite Canadian companies’ hiring aspirations next year, many have faced challenges with hiring in 2023.

Eighty-nine per cent of surveyed managers reported difficulty finding skilled professionals and 64 per cent said it takes longer to hire for open roles now than it did a year ago.

Other reported challenges were a lack of qualified applicants, hiring fast enough to land the best talent, and meeting candidates’ salary expectations.

Employers also reported being worried about keeping their most-skilled staff and making sure their team is productive as a whole, according to the survey.

When asked about their top concerns for the first half of 2024, 90 per cent of hiring managers cited fears around retaining their top talent, while 87 per cent said they worry about keeping their staff motivated and engaged.

With files from the Canadian Press

METHODOLOGY

Robert Half developed the online survey which was conducted by an independent research firm from Nov. 1-20, 2023. It includes responses from more than 1,094 managers with hiring responsibilities in the finance and accounting, technology, marketing and creative, legal, administrative and customer support, and human resources industries at companies with 20 or more employees in Canada.

 

WORKERS CAPITAL

Ontario teachers’ pension explores SeaCube stake sale

Carmen Arroyo, Paula Sambo and Gillian Tan, Bloomberg News

Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan is exploring selling the rest of its stake in SeaCube Container Leasing Ltd., according to people with knowledge of the matter. 

It’s mulling the stake sale soon after Wren House Infrastructure bought a portion of the shipping container leasing company’s equity from the pension, a transaction that closed this week. In September, Bloomberg reported that Ontario Teachers’ was in talks to sell about half of its stake in SeaCube, in a deal valuing the company at as much as US$1 billion including debt.    

A spokesperson for the pension declined to comment. A SeaCube representative didn’t respond to a request for comment.

SeaCube is based in Woodcliff Lake, New Jersey and led by Chief Executive Officer Robert Sappio.

It’s best known for refrigerated-container leasing. The Ontario pension purchased SeaCube in 2013 for $469.5 million. 

 

Bank of Canada says immigration curbs long-term inflation

Laura Dhillon Kane, Bloomberg News

Mass immigration to Canada will keep a lid on inflationary pressures in the long run, but has also strained housing markets and helped to drive rent inflation to a 40-year high, says a Bank of Canada official.

Deputy Governor Toni Gravelle said a record-high influx of newcomers has added workers to tight labour markets and significantly improved the country’s potential growth. But after immigration began ramping up in 2015, Canada’s vacancy rate for homes available to rent or buy started to fall, he said.

“Then, when newcomer arrivals picked up sharply in early 2022, that steady decline in the vacancy rate became a cliff,” he said in prepared remarks on Thursday in Windsor, Ont. “Canada’s vacancy rate has now reached a historical low.”

Gravelle delivered the speech focused on housing and immigration a day after the Bank of Canada left the benchmark overnight rate unchanged at five per cent. His remarks shed little new light on policymakers’ decision to pause, which was widely expected by markets and economists in a Bloomberg survey.

He did, however, downplay improvement in a three-month moving average of core measures that the central bank has described as key to its thinking. While that average dropped in October to about 3 per cent, at the top of the bank’s control range, the measure is “volatile,” he said.

“We must remember it’s just one month. We need to see further progress,” he said.

The bank is closely watching inflation expectations, wage growth and corporate pricing behavior, he reiterated. “These indicators are helping us assess whether inflation is on a sustained path to two per cent. Given the risks to the inflation outlook, we remain prepared to raise the policy rate further if needed.”

The impacts of immigration in Canada - which welcomed a million newcomers for the first time last year - have been hotly debated. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government argues high levels of migrants are needed to offset an aging population, but a public backlash has brewed as housing prices soar, especially amid inadequate home supply.

Gravelle said that since the start of 2022, strong immigration has boosted the level of potential output by two per cent to three per cent without adding materially to inflation. The bank estimates that the increase to consumer spending from the recent increase in newcomers added less than 0.1 percentage points to inflation.

Still, housing construction has been unable to keep up with the rapid rise in demand, and that imbalance has “serious” consequences for inflation, he said.

Shelter price inflation rose to 6.1 per cent annualized in October and contributed 1.8 percentage points to that month’s total inflation reading of 3.1 per cent. While mortgage interest costs are a factor, other components of the shelter inflation basket have not come down as much as they typically would, Gravelle said.

Rent inflation, meantime, accelerated to 8.2 per cent in October, the highest in 40 years.

The situation in Canada stands in contrast with that of the United States, where housing construction has been more flexible to respond to population shifts and where rent inflation is expected to continue to decline, he said.

“Canada needs more homes,” Gravelle said. “And we need to make our housing supply more responsive to increases in demand.”

 

Short-term rentals have 'significantly impacted' housing affordability: Desjardins

Ritika Dubey, The Canadian Press

A new Desjardins report suggests short-term rentals likely contributed to the housing affordability crisis in Canada and around the world.

The report released Monday shows the proliferation of short-term rentals on platforms such as Airbnb and Vrbo has had a significant effect on the affordability and availability of homes by reducing the number of units available for long-term rentals and resale markets.

Randall Bartlett, senior director of Canadian economics at Desjardins, said short-term rentals are often more appealing to real estate investors because they make more money from them than long-term leases.

"From the perspective of the landlord, at a time of high and rising inflation, short-term rentals may offer them an opportunity to offset some of the rising costs because they can increase the rent more quickly than they could in the long-term rental market," Bartlett said in an interview.

Citing a Conference Board of Canada study, the report suggests there was a correlation between Airbnb activity and higher long-term rental prices across 19 Canadian cities with short-term rentals.

It showed every one-percentage-point increase in the share of Airbnbs was associated with a 2.3 per cent increase in rents.

The Desjardins report, using data from analytics firm AirDNA, said Canada has more than 235,800 unique active short-term rental listings on Airbnb and Vrbo, the two largest hosting platforms, amounting to about 1.4 per cent of the country's housing stock.

The national rental vacancy rate hit 1.9 per cent in 2022 — significantly below what's considered the balanced market rate of three per cent, according to the report.

Municipalities across Canada and abroad have implemented a variety of policies to combat short-term rentals, the report said, in the hopes of opening up more housing supply as affordability continues to erode.

"We're seeing this in real-time," said Bartlett, "an experiment going on in Canada, where different jurisdictions are bringing in different regulations of various stringencies," which he said will provide greater insight into the implications for the housing market. 

Bartlett said policy crackdowns on short-term rentals have had mixed results in different jurisdictions around the world.

But, he added, it seems that restricting the use of second or third properties for short-term rentals has been the most successful in bringing more units back into the long-term rental market.

Meanwhile, allowing people to continue to use their primary residence for short-term rentals has helped sustain the app-based vacation rental market, he said.

"Having that distinction seems to support and certainly bring more rental homes back to the long-term rental market," Bartlett said.

The report suggests governments partly restrict commercial non-principal short-term rentals, strictly enforce penalties for non-compliance and hold short-term rental platforms accountable to help ease the housing crisis.

Toronto has restricted short-term rentals to a maximum of 180 nights per year for an entire home, the report noted. However, homeowners can rent out up to three bedrooms in their primary residence for an unlimited number of nights.

In British Columbia, legislation was passed in October that could return 16,000 short-term rentals to the long-term market. This requires online platform accountability — removing listings that don't include a valid business licence and sharing information about short-term rental listings with the province, which may share it with local governments. 

Nathan Rotman, Canada policy lead with Airbnb, said the Desjardins report is "misleading with the figures failing to account for Canadians sharing the home they live in or a cottage — homes that would not be added to the long-term housing market."

Rotman said while Airbnb is willing to work with municipalities to address community concerns, strict short-term rental regulations have not alleviated Canada's housing crisis.

"With the vast majority of hosts in Canada sharing just one home and more than 90 per cent of our top markets in Canada having some form of regulations in place, more home-sharing regulations are not an effective solution to address the country’s housing concerns," Rotman said.

Bartlett said: "At the end of the day, we need to increase supply dramatically and there are a lot of policies to do that." 

He forecasts 2024 is going to be a challenging year for the housing market in Canada. 

Bartlett predicts landlords will continue to feel the pressure of high interest rates on their monthly mortgage payments and a growing population will heap more demand on the housing market overall.

"There's going to be very little price relief," he said. 

"Ultimately, the measures that are being brought in to increase supply — not just by limiting short-term rentals but also cutting the GST on purpose-built rentals and reducing exclusionary zoning — will all help in the long run to bring more supply but not going to help materially in 2024."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 4, 2023.

Feds recover $40M from defunct Quebec vaccine developer Medicago

The Canadian Press

Retired nurse Donna Lessard takes part in the Medicago COVID-19 vaccine clinical trials with project co-ordinator Raphael Brochu Friday, Jan. 29, 2021, in Mirabel, Que. The parent company of Medicago Inc. has announced it will shut down the Quebec-based biopharmaceutical company which had developed a vaccine against COVID-19. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ryan Remiorz)

 

The federal government says it has recovered $40 million from the now-defunct Quebec-based vaccine developer Medicago, and the intellectual property will remain in Canada under a new firm.

The government provided Medicago a $173-million advance in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic to develop and produce a plant-based vaccine in Quebec City.

The company's Japanese parent company, Mitsubishi Chemical Group, shut down Medicago's operations in February as global demand for vaccinations plummeted.

Though Medicago's vaccine was approved for use in Canada, it was not approved by the World Health Organization due to the company's ties with tobacco giant Philip Morris.

The agreement between Canada and Mitsubishi Chemical Group will transfer the research, intellectual property and equipment to a new operation: Aramis Biotechnologies.

Aramis Biotechnologies is also based in Quebec City and is led by former Medicago employees.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 8, 2023.

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

Financial intelligence agency levies $1.3 million penalty against CIBC

Ian Bickis, The Canadian Press

Canada's financial intelligence agency says it has levied a $1.3-million penalty against CIBC for non-compliance with money laundering and terrorist financing measures.

The penalty, imposed on Oct. 23 but only reported Thursday, is the second the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada has announced this week after RBC's $7.4-million fine was publicized on Tuesday.

The agency, known as Fintrac, says it imposed the penalty over CIBC's failure to submit a suspicious transaction report when there were grounds to suspect it was related to money laundering or terrorist activity, and failures to report information related to large money transfers from outside Canada.

Fintrac tries to pinpoint money linked to illicit activities by electronically sifting through millions of pieces of information each year from banks, insurance companies, money services businesses and others.

It then discloses intelligence to police and other law-enforcement agencies about the suspected cases.

Fintrac said that during its 2021 examination, it found an instance where CIBC didn't file a suspicious transaction report even though it knew the client had been arrested and charged with criminal offences. The agency's review also found over a thousand instances, out of a sample of 20,000, where information related to money transfers was incomplete.

Sarah Paquet, chief executive of the agency, said in a statement that the rules around reporting are in place to protect Canadians and the security of the economy.

"We will also be firm in ensuring that businesses continue to do their part and we will take appropriate actions when they are needed," she said. 

CIBC spokesman Tom Wallis said in a statement that the bank has robust anti-money laundering and anti-terrorist financing procedures and practices in place. 

He said the administrative matters were related to a relatively small number of transactions that the bank has since resolved and it continues to invest in monitoring and detection capabilities.

"We take our responsibilities seriously and will continue to identify, investigate and do our part to deter and detect financial crimes," Wallis said.

Fintrac said CIBC had paid its penalty in full and proceedings have ended.

RBC, which was hit by the highest-ever penalty by the agency, was found to have failed to submit 16 suspicious transaction reports out of 130 reviewed, when there were reasonable grounds to suspect dealings were related to an attempted or actual money laundering or terrorist financing offence.

In the 2022-2023 financial year, Fintrac issued six notices of non-compliance to businesses for a total of $1,113,569 in penalties.

Fintrac has imposed more than 125 penalties across various sectors since it received the legislative authority to do so 15 years ago.

Other banks are also facing increased scrutiny for their oversight programs, including TD Bank, which disclosed earlier this year that it expects U.S. regulators to impose penalties related to the bank's anti-money laundering compliance program.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 7, 2023.