Dangerous Opportunities

Dangerous Opportunities is a timely examination of the Home Capital crisis, the ways in which the regulatory regimes engaged by the crisis - corporate, pension, securities, taxation, and mortgage - both facilitated and helped to resolve it, and the lessons that can be learned for law and policy reform going forward. Regulators, policy makers, legislators, academics, and lawyers will find it a useful and accessible text.

- Freya Kodar, Faculty of Law, University of Victoria

The Canadian housing sector usually attracts more heat than light, but Dangerous Opportunities is a penetrating and sobering study of the Home Capital saga of 2017. This insightful book by Stephanie Ben-Ishai and others clarifies how the behaviour of one small firm has the potential to infect the rest of the financial system and put the entire economy at risk. It serves as a poignant reminder that an ounce of prevention is still worth a pound of cure.

- Stephen Poloz, Special Advisor, Osler Hoskin & Harcourt, former Governor of the Bank of Canada, and author of The Next Age of Uncertainty

This important volume provides critical insights into governance and public policy. It uses the 2017 Home Capital crisis to delve into the regulation of financial institutions. But it also goes much further. The contributors to this volume show how the lessons from the Home Capital crisis are applicable to the current crisis precipitated by the COVID-19 pandemic and, alas, to future crises as well. This volume is a timely and informative read for leaders in both the private and public sectors, policy-makers, scholars, regulators, and investors.

- Adam Dodek, Professor and Dean, Faculty of Law, University of Ottawa

"Dangerous Opportunities provides valuable perspectives on a complex mix of issues associated with the near collapse of Home Capital and the regulatory context in which the saga played itself out - issues of considerable importance as Canada continues to grapple with rapid growth in non-bank private lending. The reader will leave this book with a deeper appreciation for the range of hard questions that Canadian policy makers must address as they deal with the rise of alternate lenders."

- Robert Yalden, Stephen Sigurdson Professor in Corporate Law and Finance, Faculty of Law, Queen's University