This week we announced the winners of the Lipper Fund Awards 2013 for Canada & Switzerland. The Lipper Fund Awards are part of the Thomson Reuters Awards for Excellence, a global family of awards that celebrate exceptional performance throughout the professional investment community.

The Lipper Awards were presented on February 5, 2013 at a ceremony in Toronto, Canada & Zürich, Switzerland. Phillips, Hager & North collected the top group awards for overall and bond fund group. RBC Global Asset Management and Fidelity Investments Canada both won four individual awards in total, while TD Asset Management won three awards. The full list of Canadian group award winners includes:

Canada:

Winner	Group Award
Phillips, Hager & North	Best Fund Group Overall
Mawer Investment Management	Best Equity Fund Group
Phillips, Hager & North	Best Bond Fund Group
ATB Investment Management	Best Mixed Assets Group

Franklin Templeton Investments and Jyske Invest collected the top group awards for large and respective small groups. JP Morgan won three individual awards in total, with Allianz, Avadis, Aberdeen, Invesco, and PIMCO each winning two. The full list of Swiss group award winners includes:

Switzerland:

Winner	Group Award
Franklin Templeton Investments	Best Fund Group Overall – Large
Jyske Invest	Best Fund Group Overall – Small
First State	Best Equity Fund Group – Large
Wells Fargo	Best Equity Fund Group – Small
PIMCO	Best Bond Fund Group – Large
Capital at Work	Best Bond Fund Group – Small
Franklin Templeton Investments	Best Mixed Assets Group – Large
Avadis	Best Mixed Assets Group – Small

In addition to the group awards, trophies were presented to 35 individual fund awards. Details of all winners can be found here and the Lipper Fund Awards’ 2013 methodology can be viewed here.

Canadian life science and intellectual property attorneys explain how Canada approached the approval of, and developed a regulatory structure for, what is believed to be the world’s first stem-cell-derived therapeutic product.

Cheryl Reicin and Eileen McMahon of Torys LLP in Toronto, whose practices focus, respectively, on life science and intellectual property, look at the regulatory and review processes behind Health Canada’s approval of Prochymal, believed to be the first stem-cell-based product in the world to secure regulatory certification.

(Click here for the full article on Westlaw.) (more…)

Elektron is our high performance data and trading infrastructure that connects financial institutions and trading venues across the globe. Recently, we launched two new Elektron data solutions that will help US market participants have lower latency access to broader and deeper content from financial markets venues.

The first initiative involves the launch of  the next generation consolidated feed, Elektron Real Time, in Chicago to provide local market participants with full tick depth-of-market data from multiple venues around the world. Secondly, customers using Elektron hosting centers in Chicago and New York can now access low latency direct feeds from Canadian venues to fuel cross-border algorithmic and systematic trading strategies. (more…)

State-controlled Chinese oil giant CNOOC’s $15.1 billion bid for Canadian oil company Nexen this week is the latest in a rapid expansion by Chinese enterprises gobbling up Canadian energy assets. Wenran Jiang, a senior fellow at Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada, explains what’s behind the trend.

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TrustLaw, part of the Thomson Reuters Foundation, took a poll of experts to rank the world’s major economies in terms of how good they are for women. Click here or on the above image to view the full package.

You should also check out last year’s special report on the most dangerous countries for women.

Today’s graphic compares the G8 economies with three important indicators. See how the countries match up with regard to GDP growth (Q4 2011), government debt (as a % of GDP) and military spending (% of gov’t expenditure). Do any of the figures in this chart stand out or surprise you?

Early in 1929, Roy Thomson – a salesman for De Forest Crosley, manufacturers of radio sets – moved, with his wife and family, to North Bay, Ontario.

North Baywas the sort of small Canadian town where ‘everyone knew everyone’. In summer, the town struggled to exploit its location on the shore of Lake Nipissingby advertising itself as a tourist resort. In the winter, it often became a freezing, forty-below- zero, hell.

Times were tough in North Bayand district. After the Wall Street Crash, later the same year, things would get even tougher.

In this isolated part of Canada, where the nights were long and cold and where there was little entertainment, the comforting sound of music and voices from big metropolitan cities made the idea of owning a radio irresistible. Thomson knew that, if he could only get the sets into local homes on trial, a sale should ensue – provided that the reception was good enough.

However, reception from far-distant transmitters was so bad that what most customers heard were not pleasing sounds, but gratings, whines and cracklings. When Thomson returned, hoping for a sale, he was ordered to “take that goddam yowling thing away”.

To avoid financial ruin there was only one solution. Thomson would have to open a radio station of his own right there in North Bay. He had no licence to do so, no technical knowledge, no equipment and absolutely no capital.

Having been told that a licence was essential, he was informed that no more were to be issued. He would have to obtain one already in existence.

The records showed that the Abitibi [Lumber] Company of Iroquois Falls had one. It had bought it with the intention of maintaining a radio link with its lumber camps but always talked by telephone and had never transmitted a single radio message. For one dollar, the company agreed to loan its licence to Thomson for one year, on condition that it could either ask for it back or, by not asking for it back, allow it to vest in Thomson.

Next, he approached the management of North Bay’s Capitol Cinema and pointed out that, backstage, there was room for a broadcasting studio. If the Cinema would give him this space for nothing, he would allow it to advertise its films and dance-hall free of charge. (more…)

Today’s graphic shows where Canada’s carbon emissions ranks in the world. Canada represents 2.0% of the world total emissions. Their per capita emissions are extremely high, ranking 3rd behind the US and Australia.

Part 1:

In this panel discussion from The Finance Crisis: Lessons Learned from Canada and the Way Forward, the conversation, moderated by Roger Martin, Dean of the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, focuses on Canada’s performance during the financial crisis and what regulators can take away from its success. Panelists: Michael Horgan, Deputy Minister of Finance of Canada, Sarah Dahlgren, Executive Vice President, Financial Institution Supervision Group, Federal Reserve/NY, Mark Wiseman, Executive Vice-President, Investments, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Clay Lowery, former Assistant Secretary for International Affairs, U.S. Treasury.

Part 2:

In this panel discussion from ”The Finance Crisis: Lessons Learned from Canada and the Way Forward,” Reuters’ Chrystia Freeland moderates a conversation focused on the success of Canada’s financial system through global economic turmoil and what lessons can be learned by countries with less healthy financial systems. Panelists: Ted Price, Assistant Superintendent, Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions Canada, Gordon Nixon, President and CEO, RBC Financial Group, CFTC Commissioner Jill Sommers, Tom Glocer, CEO Thomson Reuters and Nicolas Veron, Senior Fellow, Bruegel and Visiting Senior Fellow Peterson Institute.

Part 3:
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Thomson Reuters, along with the Atlantic Council, the Rotman School of Management, and The Embassy of Canada hosted special event, The Financial Crisis: Lessons Learned From Canada and The Way Forward.

Closing out the day, Financial Times US Editor Robin Harding moderated a panel on global economic growth. Participants included Tim Adams, former Under Secretary of Treasury for International Affairs, now Managing Director at The Lindsey Group; Craig Alexander, SVP and Chief Economist at TD Bank Financial Group; Troy Davig, Senior US Economist for Barclays Capital; Peter Rashish, VP for Europe and Eurasia at the US Chamber of Commerce and Alan Schwartz, Executive Chairman at Guggenheim Partners.

Adams outlined the headwinds global growth faces, including ‘welfare states we can’t afford, aging demographics and mature economies – a short term loop that is capping growth.” Rashish sounded a bit more optimistic note, stating, “the reform path leads to growth through implementation.”

Several speakers addressed the challenges that politics and national self-interests pose and the necessity for balancing, with Schwartz saying “capital is global, but politics stay local” and Alexander highlighting the need for ‘firewalls to protect against contagion”.

Panelists appeared to agree that strong actions would be required. Alexander said, “financial markets are about faith and control…you have to be bold, over-deliver, but its hard to get confidence back if you keep saying ‘it’s not enough’.” Adams stated, “shock and awe (impact) actions will require a huge commitment.”

Katharine Ramsden is managing editor, Thomson Reuters.