Jeffrey Carhart

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Jeffrey Carhart is a senior partner in the firm’s insolvency practice group. He has been recognized by Chambers Global Guide to the World’s Leading Lawyers as a leader in the field of insolvency, and designated as a specialist in bankruptcy and insolvency law by the Law Society of Ontario. Jeff’s clients include banks, trust and insurance companies, asset-based lenders, business corporations, commercial landlords as well as receivers and trustees in bankruptcy.

Jeff is the author of the book The Business Owner’s Guide to Bankruptcy & Insolvency Law in Canada, published by John Wiley & Sons. He also wrote the insolvency chapter of the book Business Laws of Canada, published by Thomson Reuters/West and he is co-author of LexisNexis Canada’s Practice Advisor module for directors and officers. Jeff has also published more than 20 articles concerning commercial insolvency issues. Several of his articles are cited in Canada’s leading text on bankruptcy and insolvency law (Houlden & Morawetz) and his article on the Asset Backed Commercial Paper case is studied in Stanford University’s Business School. Jeff has lectured at York University’s Schulich School of Business, Suffolk University Law School in Boston, Seneca College in Toronto and has spoken extensively on the subject of corporate finance and insolvency in Canada, the United States, Europe and Asia. He has been quoted and interviewed extensively in the financial press and other financial media. Jeff has served as an Instructor in the Ontario Bar Admission Course and as an Examiner on the Federal Licensing Panel for Trustees in Bankruptcy. He is also a member of The Insolvency Institute of Canada, Canada’s leading invitational organization of senior insolvency practitioners.

Jeff has extensive experience in many aspects of lending, securitizations, loan syndications, the enforcement of security over real and personal property, corporate reorganizations, receiverships and bankruptcies. Jeff has been heavily involved in many major Canadian and International corporate insolvency proceedings including Confederation Life, Eaton’s, Royal Oak Mines, The Canadian Red Cross Society, Laidlaw, Teleglobe, AT & T Canada, Oxford Automotive, Air Canada, Calpine, Muscle Tech, One King West, Red Leaves JW Marriott Resort, the Asset Backed Commercial Paper restructuring (“the largest and by far the most complex restructuring in Canada’s history”- American Lawyer Magazine), Nortel, The Source (Circuit City), Mt. Gox (bitcoin exchange) and Target Canada. Jeff appears frequently in The Ontario Superior Court and Court of Appeal on insolvency-related matters. He has more than 30 reported decisions. His cases have been identified by well-known commentators such as Professor Richard McLaren as representing important benchmarks in the development of insolvency law in Canada. Jeff also has extensive experience in dealing with business acquisitions and divestitures and securities law. He is a past director of one of his corporate clients, the Canadian subsidiary of a U.S. public company in the automotive industry. Jeff has acted as lead counsel to several major Canadian and U.S. clients with respect to the acquisition of hundreds of millions of dollars worth of assets from Canadian companies involved in court-supervised insolvency proceedings.