A number of spectators have pointed me toward the latest Bridging Finance developments and, given the recent Novaporte announcement, this seems as good a time as any to do a check-in. Bridging, in case you’ve forgotten, was the Toronto-based private debt lender that loaned Membertou Corporate $6.8 million to investRead...

Student housing The “collective enterprise” UTILE (L’Unité de travail pour l’implantation de logement étudiant) was established in 2013 “with the objective of developing a social economy student housing model specific to Quebec inspired by best practices in non-profit student housing around the world.” In 2016, working with the the ChantierRead More

Art imitating life In my research for this week’s article on the East Palestine train derailment, I ran across a piece on rail safety post-Lac Mégantic (a good piece, worth reading) that begins like this: An unmanned, half-mile-long train carrying tank cars full of highly flammable petroleum products barrels outRead More

Over the past few months, I have been following various stories about crypto currencies with a mix of incomprehension, incredulity and interest. What will be the next crypto exchange to fail? Will another crypto titan mysteriously disappear or die in suspicious circumstances? But with the collapse of FTX, and theRead More

Editor’s Note: I know what you’re thinking—the holidays are almost here, why am I not doing a year in review or some heartwarming, holiday-themed stories, or raising money for a food bank? Why am I on about that nano-materials company in Dartmouth again? The answer is a) because I haveRead More

On Tuesday, the US Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) filed a lawsuit in the US District Court for the Southern District of Texas against the following eight defendants: Edward Constantin aka MrZackMorris aka Edward Constantinescu Perry Matlock aka PJ Matlock Thomas Cooperman aka Tommy Coops Gary Deel aka Mystic Mac MitchellRead More

Eureka! I have been trying for some time now to articulate the problem with venture capital, especially as it was practiced in this province by Innovacorp—and now by Invest Nova Scotia, under the possibly capable but definitely expensive ($1,500 a day up to $18,000 a month) leadership of our premier’sRead More

Comfort and Joy I have to tie up two loose ends from my coverage of Tuesday morning’s council meeting. After listening to—and approving—Destination Cape Breton’s funding request (which I covered in detail because opaque organizations spending oodles of public money are catnip to me— or would be, if I wereRead More

A tweet from Conservative MP Michel Rempel Garner caught my eye Monday morning (I’m still able to see her tweets because I’ve never been so bold as to lock horns with her online where she’s notorious for blocking anyone who disagrees with her). It said: Tomorrow morning, my bill regardingRead More

McKenna & Co I was going to call Brookfield Asset Management (BAM) a many-headed hydra but that’s the wrong metaphor, it is decidedly more of an octopus, with tentacles everywhere in everything—railroads, ports, real estate, nuclear power—but just one head, as the Southern Investigative Reporting Foundation reported back in 2013:Read More