(1) We believe investors should receive in a long form prospectus for an IPO no less than three years of audited historical financial statements and that relief from the financial statements requirements should be granted only in unusual circumstances and generally not related solely to the cost or the time involved in preparing and auditing the financial statements.

(2) In view of our reluctance to grant exemptions from the requirement to include audited historical financial statements, issuers seeking relief should consult with staff on a pre-filing basis.

(3) Considerations relevant to granting an exemption from the requirement to include financial statements, generally for the years immediately preceding the issuer’s most recently completed financial year, may include the following:

The issuer’s historical accounting records have been destroyed and cannot be reconstructed.

(a) In this case, as a condition of granting the exemption, the issuer may be requested by a securities regulatory authority or regulator to

(i) represent in writing to the securities regulatory authority or regulator, no later than the time the preliminary long form prospectus is filed, that the issuer made every reasonable effort to obtain copies of, or reconstruct, the historical accounting records necessary to prepare and audit the financial statements, but such efforts were unsuccessful, and

(ii) disclose in the long form prospectus the fact that the historical accounting records have been destroyed and cannot be reconstructed.

The issuer has emerged from bankruptcy and current management is denied access to the historical accounting records necessary to audit the financial statements.

(b) In this case, as a condition of granting the exemption, the issuer may be requested by a securities regulatory authority or regulator to

(i) represent in writing to the securities regulatory authority or regulator, no later than the time the preliminary long form prospectus is filed, that the issuer has made every reasonable effort to obtain access to, or copies of, the historical accounting records necessary to audit the financial statements but that such efforts were unsuccessful, and

(ii) disclose in the long form prospectus the fact that the issuer has emerged from bankruptcy and current management is denied access to the historical accounting records.

The issuer has undergone a fundamental change in the nature of its business or operations affecting a majority of its operations and all, or substantially all, of the executive officers and directors of the company have changed.

(c) The evolution of a business or progression along a development cycle will not be considered to be a fundamental change in an issuer’s business or operations. Relief from the requirement to include financial statements of the issuer required by the Instrument for the year in which the change occurred, or for the most recently completed financial year if the change in operations occurred during the issuer’s current financial year, generally will not be granted.

(4) If, in unusual circumstances, relief from Part 4 of the Instrument is granted, additional financial information will likely be requested to allow a reader to gain a similar understanding of the entity’s financial position and prospects as one would gain from the information required in Part 4 of the Instrument.

Examples of acceptable additional information include an audited interim financial report, audited divisional statements of comprehensive income or cash flows, financial statements accompanied by an auditor’s report that expresses a modified opinion, or audited statements of net operating income.

If an issuer has filed annual financial statements or an interim financial report for periods that are more recent than those that the issuer must otherwise include in a long form prospectus before it files the prospectus, sections 32.6 and 35.8 of Form 41-101F1 require the issuer to include those financial statements in the long form prospectus. Issuers should update the disclosure in the prospectus accordingly in order to satisfy the requirement that the long form prospectus contain full, true and plain disclosure of all material facts relating to the securities being distributed. However, if historical financial information derived from more recent annual financial statements or interim financial report is released to the public by the issuer before the financial statements are filed, the prospectus should include the information included in the news release or public communication. There is no specific requirement in the Instrument to otherwise update the prospectus, or pro forma financial statements to reflect the more recent information.

We think the directors of an issuer should endeavor to consider and approve financial statements in a timely manner and should not delay the approval and filing of the financial statements for the purpose of avoiding their inclusion in a long form prospectus. Once the directors have approved an issuer’s financial statements, the issuer should file them as soon as possible.

Lexata note: changes to this section effective April 14, 2022 are shown in green (additions) and redline (deletions).

(1) Item 32 of Form 41-101F1 prescribes the issuer financial statements that must be included in a long form prospectus. We recognize that an issuer, at the time of filing a long form prospectus, may have been in existence for less than one year. We expect that in many situations the limited historical financial statement information that is available for such an issuer may be adequately supplemented by other relevant information disclosed in the long form prospectus. However, if the issuer cannot provide financial statements for a period of at least 12 months and the long form prospectus does not otherwise contain information concerning the business conducted or to be conducted by the issuer that is sufficient to enable an investor to make an informed investment decision, a securities regulatory authority or regulator may consider this a key factor when deciding whether it should refuse to issue a receipt for the long form prospectus.

(2) A reference to a prospectus includes a preliminary prospectus. Consequently, the time references in sections 32.2, 32.3, 35.5 and 35.6 of Form 41-101F1 should be considered as at the date of the preliminary long form prospectus and again at the date of the final long form prospectus for both the issuer and any business acquired or to be acquired. Depending on the period of time between the dates of the preliminary and final long form prospectuses, an issuer may have to include more recent financial statements.

(3) An issuer is subject to certain additional disclosure requirements when it discloses an interim financial report for a period in the year of adopting IFRS, as set out in subparagraph 32.3(2)(e) and subsection 32.3(4) of Form 41-101F1. These requirements only apply to interim financial reports relating to periods in the year of adopting IFRS and therefore do not apply if the prospectus includes annual financial statements prepared in accordance with IFRS. An issuer is required to provide an opening IFRS statement of financial position at the date of transition to IFRS. An issuer with, for example, a year-end of December 31, 2010 that files a prospectus for which it must include its first interim financial report in the year of adopting IFRS for the period ended March 31, 2011, must generally provide an opening IFRS statement of financial position at January 1, 2010.

An issuer must also include various reconciliations required by IFRS 1 to explain how the transition from previous GAAP to IFRS has affected its reported financial position, financial performance and cash flows. In the first interim period IFRS 1 requires certain additional reconciliations which relate to annual periods and the date of transition to IFRS. Where an issuer that was not a reporting issuer in at least one jurisdiction immediately before filing the prospectus includes an interim financial report in respect of the second or third interim period in the year of adopting IFRS, subsection 32.3(4) of Form 41-101F1 requires these additional reconciliations to be included in the prospectus. Alternatively, pursuant to subsection 32.3(4) of Form 41-101F1, the issuer may include the first interim financial report in the year of adopting IFRS as this report includes the required reconciliations.

These additional reconciliations may be summarized as follows:

• reconciliations of the issuer’s equity presented in accordance with previous GAAP to its equity in accordance with IFRS for the date of transition to IFRS (January 1, 2010 in the above-noted example);
• reconciliations of the issuer’s equity presented in accordance with previous GAAP to its equity in accordance with IFRS for the end of the latest period presented in the issuer’s most recent annual financial statements in accordance with previous GAAP (December 31, 2010 in the above-noted example); and
• a reconciliation of the issuer’s total comprehensive income (or total profit or loss) presented in accordance with previous GAAP to its total comprehensive income in accordance with IFRS for the latest period in the issuer’s most recent annual financial statements presented in the prospectus in accordance with previous GAAP (year ended December 31, 2010 in the above-noted example).The reconciliations summarized above must give sufficient detail to enable investors to understand the material adjustments to the statement of financial position, statement of comprehensive income and statement of cash flows.

Lexata note: changes to this section effective April 14, 2022 are shown in green (additions) and redline (deletions).

(1) An issuer may find it necessary, In order to meet the requirement for full, true and plain disclosure contained in securities legislation, an issuer may be required to include certain additional financial information in its long form prospectus., such as For instance, in exceptional circumstances, we may require separate financial statements of a subsidiary of the issuer in a long form prospectus, even if the financial statements of the that subsidiary are is included in the consolidated financial statements of the issuer. For example, separate financial statements of a subsidiary This exception may be necessary to help explain the risk profile and nature of the operations of the subsidiary.

(2) There may be other exceptional scenarios where issuers may be required to include additional financial information, other than financial statements, in a prospectus in order for the prospectus to meet the requirement for full, true and plain disclosure. An example would be where an issuer incurred significant growth through one or more acquisitions prior to the IPO filing resulting in insufficient financial history of the primary business as disclosed in the prospectus and one of the following situations occurred:

• an IPO venture issuer acquired or proposes to acquire a business that would result in any of the applicable significance tests, as calculated in section 8.3 of NI 51-102, close to exceeding the 100% threshold;
• the issuer made or proposed to make one or more acquisitions during the relevant period, but financial disclosure was not triggered by Item 32 or 35 of Form 41-101F1;
• the issuer completed a relatively large number of unrelated and individually immaterial acquisitions (that are not predecessor entities) in the relevant periods prior to filing the prospectus.

The types of additional financial information that might be necessary to meet the full, true and plain disclosure standard will vary on a case-by-case basis but may include:

• property or business valuation reports;
• forecasted cash flow information;
• additional disclosure about an acquired business, such as key financial information that explains the financial performance and operations of that business prior to its acquisition.

While it is our expectation that these circumstances will be rare, if an issuer thinks that it might fall into an exceptional circumstance where additional financial information might be required, it could utilize the pre-filing procedures in NP 11-202.

(3) If the issuer cannot provide sufficient financial history reflected in the financial statements in a prospectus or the prospectus does not otherwise contain information concerning the business conducted or to be conducted by the issuer that is sufficient to enable an investor to make an informed investment decision, we would consider this important when determining whether the prospectus provides full, true and plain disclosure of all material facts relating to the securities being distributed.

(1) Part 4 of the Instrument requires that all financial statements included in a long form prospectus be audited, except financial statements specifically exempted in the Instrument. This requirement extends to financial statements of subsidiaries and other entities even if the financial statements are not required to be included in the long form prospectus but have been included at the discretion of the issuer.

(2) NI 52-107 requires that financial statements, other than acquisition statements, that are required to be audited by securities legislation, such as this Instrument, be accompanied by an auditor’s report that expresses an unmodified opinion if they were audited in accordance with Canadian GAAS or International Standards on Auditing, or contain an unqualified opinion if they were audited in accordance with U.S. PCAOB GAAS. This requirement applies to all financial statements included in the long form prospectus under Item 32 of Form 41-101F1, including financial statements from entities acquired or to be acquired that are the primary business or the predecessor of the issuer. For greater clarity, subsections 3.12(3) and 4.12(6) of NI 52-107 only apply to financial statements included in the long form prospectus pursuant to Item 35 of Form 41-101F1. Relief may be granted to non-reporting issuers in appropriate circumstances to permit the auditor’s report on financial statements to contain a qualified opinion relating to opening inventory if there is a subsequent audited period of at least six months on which the auditor’s report expresses an unmodified opinion and the business is not seasonal. Issuers requesting this relief should be aware that NI 51-102 requires that an issuer’s comparative financial statements be accompanied by an auditors’ report that expresses an unmodified opinion.

(1) The financial statements for acquisitions of a predecessor entity, a business or businesses acquired by the issuer, or other entity must be included in the prospectus under Item 32 of Form 41-101F1, if the entities or businesses satisfy the conditions of paragraph 32.1(1)(a), (b), or (c) unless, as contemplated in subsection 32.1(2) with respect to paragraph 32.1(1)(a) or (b)

(a) the issuer was a reporting issuer in any jurisdiction of Canada on the acquisition date in the case of a completed acquisition or immediately prior to the prospectus filing in the case of a proposed acquisition,

(b) the issuer did not have only cash, cash equivalents or an exchange listing as its principal asset, and

(c) the issuer provides disclosure under Item 35 of Form 41-101F1. The disclosure requirements applicable to a reporting issuer in Item 35 are intended to reflect the requirements that would be prescribed for such acquisitions in the reporting issuer’s business acquisition report.

(2) An issuer that is subject to Item 32 must also consider the necessity of including pro forma financial statements pursuant to section 32.7 of Form 41-101F1 to illustrate the impact of the acquisition on the issuer’s financial position and results of operations. However, these pro forma financial statements are only required if their inclusion is necessary for the prospectus to contain full, true and plain disclosure of all material facts relating to the securities being distributed. Examples of when pro forma financial statements would likely be necessary are in cases where:

(a) the issuer has acquired multiple businesses over the relevant period; or

(b) the issuer has an active business and has acquired another business that will constitute its primary business going forward.

In certain circumstances, an issuer may need to disclose multiple acquisitions in its prospectus where the acquisitions include an acquisition of a primary business or predecessor entity to which section 32.1 of Form 41-101F1 applies and a significant acquisition to which only item 35 of Form 41-101F1 applies. In this case, the issuer may wish to present one set of pro forma financial statements reflecting the results of all of the acquisitions, as contemplated separately in each of sections 32.8 and 35.7 of Form 41-101F1. The securities regulatory authority or regulator would not generally object to providing this relief. However the issuer must request the relief when filing its preliminary prospectus.

Requests for exemptions from financial disclosure should be made in accordance with Part 19 of the Instrument, which requires the issuer to make submissions in writing along with the reasons for the request. Written submissions should be filed at the time the preliminary long form prospectus is filed, and include any proposed alternative disclosure. If the application involves a novel and substantive issue or raises a novel public policy concern, issuers should use the pre-filing procedures under NP 11-202. Issuers that are not filing their prospectuses under NP 11-202 should also follow the principles outlined and procedures set out in NP 11-202.

Lexata note: changes to this section effective April 14, 2022 are shown in green (additions) and redline (deletions).

(1) An issuer is required to provide historical financial statements under Item 32 of Form 41-101F1 for a business or related businesses that a reasonable investor would regard as the primary business of the issuer. The issuer is also required to include the applicable MD&A for the primary business.

However, if the issuer is a reporting issuer whose principal assets are not cash, cash equivalents or an exchange listing, and the acquisition of the primary business represents a significant acquisition for the issuer, the reporting issuer is subject to the requirements of Item 35 of Form 41-101F1, and not Item 32 of Form 41-101F1, in respect of the financial statements and other disclosure for the that acquisition.

An acquisition does not include a reverse takeover, as defined in NI 41-101 which cross-references the meaning of acquisition as used in Part 8 of NI 51-102. Therefore A reporting issuer cannot rely on the exemption in subsection 32.1(2) of Form 41-101F1 if the applicable transaction is a reverse takeover. In such circumstances, the reverse takeover acquirer would be considered the primary business under either paragraph 32.1(1)(a) or (b) of Form 41-101F1.

Examples of when a reasonable investor would regard the primary business of the issuer or businesses acquired, or proposed to be acquired, to be the acquired primary business or related businesses  of the issuer, thereby triggering the application of Item 32 of Form 41-101F1 are when the acquisition(s) was or will be

(a) a reverse takeover,

(b) a qualifying transaction for a Capital Pool Company, or under the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange,

(c) a qualifying acquisition or qualification transaction by a special purpose acquisition corporation under the policies of a recognized exchange,

(d) an acquisition that satisfies any of the applicable significance tests set out in subsection 8.3(2) of NI 51-102 if “30 percent” is a significant acquisition at over the read as 100% level under subsection 35.1(4) of Form 41-101F1 percent (see example 1 below).

(e) an acquisition that results in a fundamental change in the primary business of the issuer, as disclosed in the prospectus (see example 2 below).

For paragraph (d), if the issuer qualifies as an IPO venture issuer, it should refer to paragraphs 8.3(2)(a) and (b) of NI 51-102 for the applicable significance tests.

An issuer may re-calculate the significance of a transaction using the optional significance tests set out in subsection 8.3(4) of NI 51-102, and should refer to paragraph 35.1(4)(b) of Form 41-101F1, except (i) and (ii), for the applicable financial periods and references.

For any proposed acquisition, the issuer should refer to the guidance in subsection 5.9(3) of this Policy to determine whether a reasonable person would believe that the likelihood of the acquisition being completed is high.

In addition to the above,the issuer should consider the facts of each situation to, including the facts of the business or related businesses acquired or proposed to be acquired, and determine whether a reasonable investor would regard the primary business of the issuer to be the acquired business or related businesses.

The disclosure in the prospectus, including financial statements and applicable MD&A, must satisfy the requirement that the long form prospectus contain full, true and plain disclosure of all material facts relating to the securities being distributed.

Example 1: A non-venture issuer completed an acquisition exceeding the 100% threshold for any of the significance tests in the year prior to its most recently completed financial year

Facts:

• A non-venture issuer filed a preliminary IPO prospectus on April 1, 2021 that included audited annual financial statements for its financial year ended December 31, 2020.
  
• The issuer disclosed in the prospectus that it had completed Acquisition A on October 1, 2019.
• Both the issuer and Acquisition A have a December 31 year-end.

The initial determination of the significance of an acquisition would be calculated based on the financial statements of the issuer and the acquired business or related businesses for the most recently completed financial year of each that ended before the acquisition date. In this case, the significance tests would be based on the most recently completed financial year before the acquisition date (i.e., December 31, 2018) — applying paragraph 35.1(4)(b) of Form 41-101F1 for the purposes of the periods used for the calculation.

Initial tests: Significance tests results based on the most recently completed financial year before the acquisition date (i.e., December 31, 2018)

• The following is a summary of certain key information:

Acquisition A is regarded to be the primary business of the issuer because it exceeded the 100% threshold for the asset test.

In some circumstances, an issuer may have grown between the date on which the significance tests are calculated and the date of the IPO such that the acquisition is no longer significant enough for a reasonable investor to regard the acquisition as the primary business of the issuer. An issuer could demonstrate this by testing significance using optional significance tests as set out in subsection 8.3(4) of NI 51-102, for the periods set out in subparagraphs 35.1(4)(b)(iii) and (iv) of Form 41-101F1. In this specific example, the applicable time period for the optional significance tests is the year-ended December 31, 2020 for both the issuer and Acquisition A.

We note that financial statements for the year ended December 31, 2020 for Acquisition A are required for the issuer to use the optional significance tests, which can only be used by the issuer after the acquisition date if the business remained substantially intact and was not significantly reorganized, and no significant assets or liabilities were transferred to other entities, as set out in subsection 8.3(6) of NI 51-102.

Optional significance tests: Significance tests results based on the most recently completed financial year (i.e., as at December 31, 2020)

• • The following is a summary of certain key information:

Application of paragraph 32.1(1)(b) of Form 41-101F1:

• Although Acquisition A exceeds the 100% threshold for the asset test using the initial significance tests, by applying the optional significance tests, the issuer may be able to demonstrate that a reasonable investor would not regard Acquisition A to be the primary business of the issuer.
• In this circumstance, the issuer experienced growth subsequent to acquiring Acquisition A such that Acquisition A no longer exceeds the 100% threshold. As a result, a reasonable investor would not regard Acquisition A to be the primary business of the issuer. Therefore, the issuer would not be required to provide historical financial statements of Acquisition A under Item 32 of Form 41-101F1.
• However, if the issuer applied the optional significance tests and Acquisition A still exceeded the 100% threshold for any of the significance tests, the issuer would have been required to provide audited financial statements of Acquisition A for enough periods so that when those periods are added to the periods for which the issuer’s financial statements are included in the prospectus, the results of the issuer and Acquisition A, either separately or on a consolidated basis, total 3 years. This means that the issuer would have been required to include in the IPO prospectus:
  • its audited consolidated financial statements for each of the 3 years ended December 31, 2020, 2019 and 2018, which include the results of Acquisition A from October 1, 2019 onwards, and
  • the audited standalone financial statements of Acquisition A for the period from January 1, 2019 to September 30, 2019, and for the year-ended December 31, 2018.

Example 2: An issuer has recently changed its primary business through the acquisition of a new business and the acquisition does not meet the 100% threshold for any of the significance tests.

Facts:

• An IPO venture issuer filed a preliminary IPO prospectus on April 1, 2021.
• The issuer was incorporated on January 1, 2015 to operate a mining exploration and development business.
• On December 19, 2020, the issuer acquired a cannabis cultivation property and announced its intention to convert its existing business to a cannabis cultivation business in 2021.
• The year end of the issuer and the acquired cannabis cultivation business is December 31.

Application of paragraph 32.1(1)(b) of Form 41-101F1:

• To meet the requirements of paragraph 32.1(1)(b) of Form 41-101F1, the issuer must include in the prospectus its audited financial statements for the years ended December 31, 2020 and 2019.
• In addition, given that the issuer has fundamentally changed its primary business to cannabis cultivation activities, the pre-acquisition financial statements for the acquired cannabis cultivation business (along with the related MD&A) must also be included in the prospectus.
• This is because a reasonable investor reading the prospectus would regard the primary business of the issuer to be the cannabis cultivation business, as referenced in paragraph 32.1(1)(b) of Form 41-101F1.

(2) The periods for which the issuer must provide financial statements under Item 32 of Form 41-101F1 for an acquired business or related businesses that are regarded as the primary business of the issuer should be determined in reference to sections 32.2 and 32.3 of Form 41-101F1, and with the same exceptions, where applicable, set out in paragraphs 32.4(1) (a) through (e) of Form 41-101F1. For example, for an issuer that is a reporting issuer in at least one jurisdiction immediately before filing a long form prospectus, the reference to three 3 years in subparagraph 32.2(6)(a) of Form 41-101F1 should be read as two 2 years under paragraphs 32.4(1) (a), (b), (d) and (e) of Form 41-101F1.

In addition, subsection 32.2(6) of Form 41-101F1 requires an issuer to include the financial statements for those entities or businesses set out in paragraphs 32.1(1)(a) and (b) of Form 41-101F1 for as many periods before the acquisition as may be necessary. This is so that when these periods are added to the periods for which the issuer’s financial statements are included in the prospectus, the results of the entities or businesses, either separately or on a consolidated basis, total the required number of annual periods (2 or 3 years). These financial statements must be audited.

The issuer must also consider the necessity of including pro forma financial statements pursuant to section 32.7 of Form 41-101F1 to illustrate the impact of the acquisition of the primary business on the issuer’s financial position and results of operations. For additional guidance, an issuer should refer to section 5.10 of this Policy.

(3) Reporting issuers are reminded that an acquisition may constitute the acquisition of a business for securities legislation purposes, even if the acquired set of activities or assets does not meet the definition of a “business” for accounting purposes.