Briefly:

Previous Brieflies this week: | MON | TUE | WED | THU |

(June 27, 2008) Former Victoria-based Berkshire advisor Ian Thow has been formally charged with 25 counts of fraud over $5,000 as a result of an investigation conducted by the RCMP’s Integrated Market Enforcement Team (IMET) with the assistance of the Victoria Police Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in the U.S.

IMET said it began investigating Thow in the summer of 2005, based on a complaint received from Berkshire Investment Group. It has been alleged that Thow defrauded clients of more than $30 million, by selling them non-existent investments to support his own lavish lifestyle, which included private jets and luxury cars.

IMET says it has investigated about $10 million in investor losses.

“Cases like this take a long time and a lot of work and commitment from many people to reach this stage. For the sake of the victims, I’m pleased that we’re moving forward with the court process,” says Inspector George Pemberton, officer in charge of Vancouver IMET.

In December, the BCSC fined Thow $6 million for his fraud.

“This case represents one of the most callous and audacious frauds this province has seen,” the BCSC panel wrote in its decision. “Through his serious misconduct, Thow significantly harmed investors as described in the findings, and damaged the integrity of British Columbia’s capital markets.”

There is still the lingering question of whether Thow will ever stand in Canada. It is believed he is living near Seattle, Washington, where he was last reported to be working as a mortgage broker, although his employers fired him in the fall of 2007.

• • •

CAW trashes foreign investment proposals

(June 27, 2008) The elimination of foreign investment barriers proposed by the government-appointed Competition Policy Review panel on Thursday would accelerate foreign takeovers of Canadian firms and further hollow out Canada’s economy, the Canadian Auto Workers union says.

“These protections are in place to defend the economic interests of Canadians,” says Buzz Hargrove, the CAW’s president. “Prime Minister Harper’s wrong-headed economic policies have steered Canadians down a very dangerous path, and we don’t need more of the same.”

CAW economist Jim Stanford says some of the proposals would exacerbate problems rather than solve them. Among its 65 recommendations, the panel calls for fewer restrictions on foreign investment and for the elimination of all remaining barriers to foreign control in Canada’s airline industry — which Stanford says has already been negatively impacted by overcapacity and over-competition since the 1980s.

“This report clearly overlooks the devastating effect that major foreign investment flows have had on the value of our dollar and on Canadian jobs, particularly in the manufacturing sector,” says Stanford. “Instead, it calls for more of the same hands-off policies that have crippled our country’s industrial base, and are destroying our environment.”

(06/27/08)