Directors
David J. Kassie (Group Chairman)
Peter Brown (Chairman & Founder)
Paul Reynolds
Charles Bralver
Massimo Carello
William J Eeuwes
Michael Harris
Terrence A. Lyons
Michael A. Walker
Board Committees
Audit Committee
Corporate Governance and Compensation Committee
Please review our Board Mandate for responsibilities of our
members of the Board.
Biographies of Directors
David Kassie (2010)
David Kassie is Group Chairman of Canaccord Financial Inc. David was Principal, Chairman and CEO of Genuity Capital Markets [November 2004 to May 2010] at which time Genuity was acquired by Canaccord Financial Inc. He is the former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of CIBC World Markets and the Vice Chairman of CIBC [from 1979 – 2004].
Mr. Kassie has extensive experience as an advisor, underwriter and principal. He sits on a number of corporate boards. Mr. Kassie is actively involved in community and charitable organizations and is on the Boards of the Hospital for Sick Children, the Ivey School of Business and the Toronto International Film Festival Group.
Mr. Kassie holds a B.Comm. (Honours) in Economics from McGill University, 1977 and an MBA from the University of Western Ontario, 1979.
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Peter M. Brown, O.B.C., LL.D. (1997)
One of the leading figures in Canada’s investment community, Peter Brown is Chairman and Founder of Canaccord Financial. Canaccord Financial is one of Canada’s largest independent investment dealers with head office in Vancouver, B.C. and thirty-two offices across Canada, the U.S., London and China.
Mr. Brown is currently serving as Chairman of the Board of Trustees for the Fraser Institute. Mr. Brown is B.C.’s representative on the Advisory Committee to the Canadian Securities Transition Office. He is currently serving as a federally appointed Lead Director and Member of the Finance Committee for the Vancouver 2010 Olympic & Paralympics Games. He is a Director of the Vancouver Convention Centre Expansion Project Limited & Pavilion Corp (both Crown Corporations). He is also a Director and Member of the Executive Committee of the Investment Industry Association of Canada.
Mr. Brown has served on the boards of numerous private sector and crown corporations. Among his attainments, he is the past Chairman of the University of British Columbia, The Vancouver Stock Exchange, B.C. Place Corporation and B.C. Enterprise Corporation (both Crown Corporations). He was also the Vice Chairman of Expo 86 Corporation.
Mr. Brown is a past recipient of the B.C. Chamber of Commerce Businessman of the Year award; the B.C. & Yukon Chamber of Mines Financier Award, the Pacific Entrepreneur of The Year Award for 2001 and in 2002 the Distinguished Service Award by the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada. In January 2003, Mr. Brown received a Commemorative Medal for the Golden Jubilee of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth. In June 2003, he was awarded the Order of British Columbia. The Brotherhood Inter-Faith Society recognized Peter Brown as their Person of the Year in February 2004. In the Spring of 2005, Mr. Brown received an Honourary Degree (Doctor of Laws) from the University of British Columbia. In 2007, he received the Distinguished Graduate Award from St. George’s School and the Ted Ticknor Award for Exceptional Contribution from Big Brothers of Greater Vancouver. Mr. Brown received the Fraser Institute’s T. Patrick Boyle Founder’s Award in 2009. He also became a Honourary Member of the Vancouver Police Pipe Band. In 2010, Peter Brown was inducted into the Canadian Mining Hall of Fame recognizing his entrepreneurial spirit and contribution to Canada’s mining industry. He also received the first ever civilian commendation from the Vancouver City Police. Ernst & Young recognized him with the Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010 and in May 2011 he was inducted into the Business Laureates of BC Hall of Fame.
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Paul D. Reynolds (2005)
Paul Reynolds was named as President of Canaccord Financial Inc. in August 2006 and CEO in August 2007. He is very active in investment banking operations and leads the firm from Canaccord's Toronto office.
Mr. Reynolds has over 20 years of experience in the securities industry, beginning as a floor trader. He joined Canaccord in 1985, working as an Investment Advisor in Vancouver. Mr. Reynolds specialized in financing emerging and developing companies in the resource, technology and biotechnology sectors.
Between 1999 and 2008, he managed Canaccord's London, England office as President and COO of European operations. Mr. Reynolds has been integral to the development of our business in Europe and a primary contributor to our successful position as an active participant in the European equity markets, specializing in small to medium-sized emerging companies.
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Charles N. Bralver (2010)
Mr. Bralver is a Partner and Head of Client Advisory of Massif Partners. He was previously a founding partner and Vice Chairman of Oliver, Wyman & Co. and led its Capital Markets practice, European, and North American businesses. He has also served as Senior Associate Dean for International Business and Finance at the Fletcher School of Tufts University, and as a Strategic Adviser to Warburg Pincus LLC. Mr. Bralver is a Director of Newstar Financial, a member of the Senior Advisory Board of Oliver Wyman, and sits on the boards of the Fletcher School of Tufts University and the Dickey Center for International Understanding at Dartmouth College. He is the author of several articles on trading market structure and economics.
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Massimo Carello (2008)
Audit Committee
Mr. Carello was the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Diners Club UK Ltd. from 2001 to 2004 and was the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Fiat UK Ltd. from 1990 to 2001. Mr. Carello served as a member of the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) Presidents Committee from 1998 to 2003 and was a member of the CBI European Committee. He was Vice President of the Italian Chamber of Commerce in the UK from 1998 to 2005. Mr. Carello is a non-executive director and a member of the audit committee of Uranium One Inc. (a uranium producer listed on the Toronto and Johannesburg Stock Exchanges).
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William J. Eeuwes (2002)
Audit Committee
Corporate Governance and Compensation Committee
Vice President of Manulife Capital, with more than 25 years of experience in underwriting and the management of a broad range of asset classes. Mr. Eeuwes is a Fellow of the Institute of Canadian Bankers and is a director of a number of other public companies.
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Michael D. Harris (2004)
Corporate Governance and Compensation Committee
Mike Harris was born in Toronto in 1945, and was raised in Callander and North Bay, Ontario. Prior to his election to the Ontario Legislature in 1981, Mike Harris was a schoolteacher, a School Board Trustee and Chair, and an entrepreneur in the Nipissing area.
On June 8, 1995 Mike Harris became the twenty-second Premier of Ontario following a landslide election victory. In 1999, he was re-elected — making him the first Ontario Premier in over 30 years to form a second consecutive majority government.
After leaving office in 2002, Mr. Harris formed his own consulting firm. As President of Steane Consulting Ltd., Mr. Harris serves as an advisor to several Canadian companies, including Cassels Brock and Blackwell LLP as Senior Business Advisor.
Mr. Harris also serves as a Director on several public boards including Magna International Inc. (Lead Director and Chair of the Corporate Governance and Compensation Committee); Chartwell Seniors Housing REIT (Chair of the Board of Trustees and member of the Compensation, Governance and Nominating Committee); Canaccord Financial (Director and Chair of the Corporate Governance and Compensation Committee); FirstService Corporation (Director and member of the Corporate Governance and Compensation Committee); and Route1 (Chairman of the Board).
He is also a Director on the Board of the Tim Horton Children’s Foundation.
As well, he is a Senior Fellow with The Fraser Institute, a leading Canadian economic, social research and education organization.
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Terrence A. Lyons (2004)
Audit Committee
Corporate Governance and Compensation Committee
Chairman of Northgate Minerals Corporation and a director of several private companies. In 1986, he became Senior Vice President of Versatile Corporation and presided over the restructuring of the corporation, which is now known as B.C. Pacific Capital Corporation, a senior merchant and investment banking company, which is part of Brookfield Asset Management.
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Michael A. Walker (2006)
Dr. Michael Angus Walker is a Senior Fellow at the Fraser Institute and President of The Fraser Institute Foundation. From its inception in 1974, until September 2005, Dr. Walker directed the activities of The Fraser Institute, an independent public policy organization. Before that he taught at Carleton University and prior to that at the University of Western Ontario. He has previously worked at the Bank of Canada and then subsequently joined the Federal Department of Finance. He received his Ph.D. at the University of Western Ontario and his B.A. at St. Francis Xavier University, Nova Scotia.
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Board Committees
The Board has delegated certain of its responsibilities to two committees, each of which has specific roles and responsibilities as defined by the Board. All Board committees are made up solely of non-management directors, a majority of whom are unrelated directors.
Audit Committee
The Audit Committee assists the Board of Directors in fulfilling its oversight responsibilities by monitoring the Company's financial reporting practices and financial disclosure. It comprises two unrelated directors and a third director who is related only as a director of a subsidiary. All members of the Audit Committee are financially literate; that is, they
are able to read and understand a set of financial statements that present a breadth and level of complexity of accounting issues that are generally comparable to the breadth and complexity of the issues that can reasonably be expected to be raised by the Company's financial statements.
The Audit Committee has adopted a charter which specifically defines the roles and responsibilities of the Audit Committee. The Audit Committee Charter can be found in the Company's AIF filed on SEDAR. The Audit Committee has direct communication channels with the external auditors and Chief Financial Officer and senior finance staff and discusses and reviews issues with each of them on a regular basis.
The Audit Committee is responsible to ensure management has designed and implemented an effective system of internal control. The external auditors are hired by and report directly to the Audit Committee. After consultation with management, the Audit Committee is responsible for setting the external auditors' compensation. The external auditors attend each meeting of the Audit Committee, and a portion of each meeting is held without the presence of management. The Audit Committee reviews and approves annually the external auditors' audit plan and must approve any non-audit work by the external auditors. The Chief Financial Officer and senior finance staff attend each meeting of the Audit Committee other than the portion of the meeting which is held without management present to allow a more open discussion. The Audit Committee reviews and approves annually the internal audit plan.
Audit Committee Charter
The current members of the Audit Committee are:
- Massimo Carello
- Terrence A. Lyons (Chair)
- William J. Eeuwes
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Corporate Governance and Compensation Committee
The Corporate Governance and Compensation Committee is responsible for developing the Company's approach to governance issues, reviewing the Company's overall governance principles and recommending changes to those principles from time to time. The committee has full access to staff and resources. At all regular committee meetings during the year, a portion of such meeting is held without management present to allow a more open discussion.
The current members of the Corporate Governance and Compensation Committee are:
- Michael D. Harris (Chair)
- William J. Eeuwes
- Terrence E. Lyons
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