Wednesday, May 18, 2024 – 8:30 a.m. ET
- The Association’s finances are healthy with approximately $2.5M of funds as of December 31, 2023, up some $250,000 from the prior period, dedicated to and available for our activities within our non-for-profit mandate.
- The Association’s membership base is stable at 560 members as of April 30, 2024, which is consistent with historical trends and variations.
- Regarding the Association’s young members, the Young IFA Network (YIN), chaired by Marc André Gaudreau Duval from Davies, has had an engaging and busy year. The membership of the YIN committee is at an all-time high (15 members) with broad representation of geographies and backgrounds, most notably three members who are full-time academic professors. YIN study group events have continued in 2023 and into 2024 with strong attendance and participation by attendees. The YIN Committee actively participated in the 2024 IFA Canada Seminar by presenting, in collaboration with YIN USA and YIN Mexico, the YIN panel on the topic of “Show me the Money: Employee stock incentives”, as well as providing rapporteurs for the speaker panels and hosting the YIN after-party. YIN Canada will host a webinar on Pillar 2 and the Global Minimum Tax Act on June 12th. Also, YIN Canada will be organizing a joint webinar with Australia during which the speakers will review the most significant transfer pricing court cases of each country. Finally, Marc André has been appointed to serve on the Central committee of YIN.
- The Canadian WIN (Women of IFA Network) committee, led by Kim Maguire from Oslers, continues to be very active in Canada and globally. A WIN reception was included as part of the annual conference and is open to all to attend.WIN also plans to have one virtual event in 2024 and hopes to appoint a representative from WIN Canada to WIN global.
- The Association has been busy providing engaging and topical scientific events to our membership.
- The 2024 Canadian Travelling Lecture featured Heydon Wardell-Burrus (OECD) with Brian Ernewein (KPMG) as a discussant.Lectures were in-person in Ottawa, Toronto, and Vancouver.
- In March 2024 Montreal hosted the Global Travelling Lecture organized by IFA Central with the able local assistance of Angelo Nikolakakis (EY). There were 12 lectures around the world and the Canadian stop had approximately 70 attendees. The lecturer was Caroline Silberztein (France) on the topic “International Tax Dispute Resolution”. Lecture discussants were Jennifer Paul (Canada Revenue Agency), Sébastien Rheault (IFA Canada, Barsalou Lawson Rheault LLP) and Josephine L. Scalia (TEI).
- The 2023 Canadian Annual International Tax Seminar in Calgary was co-organized by Sarah Chiu from Felesky Flynn and Byron Beswick from KPMG and was a great success with record attendance.
- The 2024 Canadian Annual International Tax Seminar in Montreal was co-chaired by Laura Gheorghiu (Gowlings) and Ana Mata (AtkinsRéalis) and broke 2023’s registration record with nearly 350 registered. This year’s conference was also the North American Region meeting place with most panels featuring US and Mexican speakers and with delegates from the US and Mexico attending the seminar. This year’s seminar organisation focused on three specific objectives: 1. US and Mexican participants; 2. Industry participants on each panel; and 3. Gender balance on every panel. I would like to extend special thanks to Laura and Ana for a very successful Seminar.
- We are most excited by the fact that in 2023 Canada was officially awarded the 2028 Global Congress to be hosted in Montreal. To that end the IFA Canada Executive has appointed an organizing committee to be chaired by Patrick Marley (Osler) and including Laura Gheorghiu (who will be IFA Canada president at time of the 2028 congress); Ana Mata (as industry representative); Angelo Nikolakakis (Canadian representative on the PSC); and Michael Kandev (current president, past YIN rep on the PSC, as co-opted PSC representative). This committee will be further expanded with a YIN and WIN representative. An important aspect relevant to the 2028 congress is that it will be organised under a new system whereby IFA Central will take the lead on and will bear the financial burden of reserving the various venues for the congress. This has an important effect on our Association’s finances which traditionally were centered on building up a fund for the hosting of a global congress. With the diminished need for such a fund, IFA Canada is focusing on other ways to serve its membership and pursue its non-for-profit mandate.
- Under the leadership of Lynn Moen, our immediate past president, IFA Canada has been working on designing and operationalizing a scholarship, awards and prizes program consistent with the Association’s purposes of considering issues concerning international and comparative public finance and taxation, together with financial and economic problems connected therewith. A request form for funding proposals regarding grants, scholarships and awards has been circulated. Applications are open until the end of May so please inform your networks of these opportunities. Angelo Nikolakakis, Jinyan Li, Laura Gheorghiu and the YIN committee are preparing funding applications. Thank you to all committee members that assisted with developing the funding policy.Please reach out to Lynn with any questions.
- I would like to especially thank our IFA staff, Robyn Corrigan, Shelly Ali and Melanie Dabah for all the work they have done over the past year. They are instrumental in organizing all of our events and have been responsible for these events being professionally run and organized.
- Finally, I would like to extend my special thanks to our executive, comprised of Kim Maguire, Laura Gheorghiu, Amanda Heale, Sarah Chiu and Marc André Gaudreau Duval and with a special thanks to our immediate past president Lynn Moen. Working with these dedicated and brilliant individuals is an absolute pleasure.
Michael Kandev
Davies Ward Phillips & Vineberg LLP
Montreal
