Foreign Listed Issuer Subject To Canadian Securities Law Class Action

The Ontario Court of Appeal recently issued its decision in Abdula v. Canadian Solar Inc. The decision continues a trend in which Canadian courts and tribunals have been willing to enforce securities laws beyond provincial and territorial boundaries. The Court confirmed that the statutory cause of action for misrepresentation set out in the Securities Act (Ontario) applied to Canadian Solar, a company whose shares trade on NASDAQ and not on any Canadian stock exchange and whose principal place of business is in the People's Republic of China. This decision, in addition to recent jurisprudence from the Supreme Court of Canada (the SCC), is of consequence to foreign companies with a significant or limited connection to any Canadian jurisdiction.