- Consultation auprès des Canadiens et des Canadiennes -

Présentation de Jim Logan en réponse à la consultation du ministère des Finances Canada sur les Questions fiscales et autres liées aux entités intermédiaires cotées en bourse (fiducies de revenu et sociétés de personnes en commandite) : 

Dans le cadre des consultations, les personnes intéressées peuvent faire des observations sur ce site dans les deux langues officielles ou dans la langue officielle de leur choix. Les observations affichées sur le site de Finances Canada le sont dans la (ou les) langue (s) dans laquelle (lesquelles) elles ont été reçues.

My opinion would be that income trusts should no longer be an eligible investment for non-taxable/tax deferred entities such as pension funds or individual RRSP accounts.  This action should be taken prospectively rather than retroactively so as not to damage people who have invested in income trusts in the past and force the dumping of units on the market.

I believe this solution would cause the least disruption and damage to investors since there should still be a healthy market for income trusts with taxable funds.  I believe it would also address the concern of the Federal Government with respect to the deferral of taxes since there would no longer be any deferral of tax on the trust income. In addition I believe trusts are actually healthy for the economy because they force businesses to distribute money to the investors.  There are far too many cases of corporate executives squandering investor money in misguided expansions, mergers, and acquisitions. I read a statistic in the Economist magazine a couple of years ago that two thirds of all mergers and acquisitions turn out to be detrimental to the companies involved not to mention the interests of consumers. In Canada all one has to do is recall the examples of Bell Canada and CIBC to be concerned about letting powerful senior executives have control of large amounts of cash retained in a corporation. Let’s get the cash in the average investors’ hands.

Jim Logan
Sarnia, Ontario