“If you are a Canadian income fund and you want to grow, you don’t need to be limited by opportunities you find in Canada or to opportunities that are relatively small in relation to your existing size,” said Jamie Scarlett. “The U.S. market is a much broader and deeper market. If you go fishing in that pond, you are going to find bigger, more substantial targets.”
Though unaffected by concerns raised last year over U.S. tax issues, Connors Bros. Income Fund is now being used as a model for several unannounced cross-border acquisition deals in the works.
"Connors shows you that we can clearly develop a structure that makes the auditors quite happy,” said Scarlett. “We developed a structure that is tax-effective and maximizes value and cash flow out to investors. You end up putting all of those elements together, and you have for Connors a really transformational transaction.”