CSA Issues Warning To Issuers Regarding Promotional Activities

On November 29, 2018, the Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) published CSA Notice 51-356 Problematic promotional activities by issuers ("Notice 51-356"). The notice warns issuers to avoid promotional activities that may artificially increase an issuer's share price and trading volume, or may mislead investors.

In the notice, the CSA provides a number of examples of common promotional activities which may be deemed misleading. Some examples are:

• distributing promotional material via social media or otherwise, that describes early stage plans which do not have any warranted certainty;
• making public statements about the growth of markets or demand for an issuer's product without any supporting evidence;