Eight Capital, a Bay Street investment dealer that specialized in speculative industries such as cannabis and junior resources, is winding down, according to four sources familiar with the situation.
Eight’s partnership committee voted to dissolve the firm late Tuesday, according to a memo seen by The Globe and Mail, and the dealer has ceased executing trade orders.
Roughly a dozen employees from Eight’s sales and trading arm, as well as its mining advisory practice, are expected to join Stifel Canada, three of the sources said. They include top producers Winston Miles, Kevin Costa and David Morrison. In total, Eight has around 60 employees.
The Globe is not naming its sources because they were not authorized to speak publicly. Eight and Stifel did not return requests for comment.
Eight has been in business since 2016 but has deep roots on Bay Street. The dealer was formerly known as Dundee Capital Markets, and changed its name after senior employees purchased the assets from Dundee Corp. and spun them out into a stand-alone firm.
Canada’s cannabis boom caught fire just as Eight started out and the investment bank became a prominent underwriter and trader for Canadian marijuana producers. However, the market for these deals dried up in 2018 and many companies have watched their share prices slump 90 per cent or more from their peaks.
In recent years Eight has leaned more heavily on its junior resources and technology practices and has won some notable mandates, including serving as a joint bookrunner for Foran Mining Corp.’s $260-million share offering in 2024. But deal flow in these sectors has fallen dramatically and independent investment dealers of all stripes have struggled.
Historically, Canada had a booming junior resource market and a number of independent investment banks such as GMP Capital, FirstEnergy and Peters & Co. served as their go-to advisers. That all changed more than a decade ago after the commodity supercycle crashed in 2012 and oil prices plummeted in 2014.
Although large Canadians producers such as Teck Resources Ltd. and Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. have seen their share prices perform well, junior producers struggle to raise money, which means fees for their advisers have dried up and a number have merged or closed down.
Stifel made a splash in Canada in 2019 by acquiring GMP’s capital markets division. The company’s Canadian arm is currently run by Harris Fricker, who used to run GMP.
Based in St. Louis, Mo., Stifel is a sizable American company, worth US$11-billion, but it too has already had to restructure in Canada. In 2024 the company closed its Calgary office, cutting roughly 35 employees.
At the time, Stifel told The Globe that “current market conditions and operations costs necessitate this action.”