Eugene Melnyck, a wealthy Canadian who lives in Barbados, may have won one battle in this island’s top court but has lost another in Ontario.
Several weeks after the Barbados Court of Appeal ruled in his favour in a case involving the 2004 Gold Cup in horse racing, the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC), the watchdog agency for publicly traded companies in the Canadian province, slapped Melnyk with a five-year ban from senior corporate roles in public companies there.
In addition, the race horse owner has agreed to pay CAN$565 000 in costs towards a regulatory investigation into his conduct involving the pharmaceutical giant Biovail Corp, which he had founded and served for years as chairman before selling his shares in 2010.
The commission’s staff and Melnyk, who owns the Senators, the National Hockey League’s team in Ottawa, jointly negotiated a settlement of the long-running case which dates back to 2003.
The commission had initially accused him and three Biovail executives of misleading investors by allegedly making disclosure about a truck accident involving a shipment of Biovail drugs.
In the end, the two sides agreed to the ban and the cost and Melnyk reportedly decided not to pursue any appeal of the commission’s findings that his actions were “contrary to the public interest” of Ontario.
For its part, the OSC said through its vice-chairman James Turner: “We are satisfied that the sanctions and undertakings . . . reflect appropriately the seriousness of Melnyk’s conduct.”
