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Goodmans' corporate finance and securities group benefits from a team that includes several lawyers who have served on Canada's top regulatory boards, including the Ontario Securities Commission and the Toronto Stock Exchange.

Over the past year, Goodmans represented Canaccord Financial in connection with the completion of a bought deal offering of 4 million cumulative five-year rate reset first preferred shares for aggregate gross proceeds of C$100 million ($104 million). Canaccord sold an additional 540,000 series A preferred shares for aggregate gross proceeds of C$13.5 ($14 million). The series A preferred shares are listed for trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange.

In December 2010, the firm represented Ivanhoe Mines in an agreement with Rio Tinto International Holdings. The transaction involved a complex financing package intended to secure funding to build the first phase of the Oyu Tolgoi copper-gold complex in southern Mongolia - the world's largest undeveloped copper and gold project. The deal included a $1.8 billion strategic rights offering.

Under department head Jean Anderson, Goodman's banking, finance and regulatory practice has being making good progress recently, with competitors noting that the firm has "stepped up the bond holding game" and that it "pioneered the income trust". Clients were also impressed: "A great understanding of business," says one customer, "They always have the answer."

In June 2010 the firm advised Aleris International as it emerged from bankruptcy to become a private company. As a private entity, Aleris is majority-owned by its creditors, led by investment funds managed by Oaktree Capital Management, affiliates of Apollo Management and Sankaty Advisors. The funds agreed to invest nearly C$700 million ($729 million) in the reorganised company through a combination of a rights offering and new equity. Aleris simultaneously entered into a $500 million multi-currency revolving asset-based lending credit facility from Bank of America to provide working capital liquidity and letters of credit.

Goodmans also advised Wells Fargo Capital Finance as administrative agent, co-collateral agency and lead lender in a $832 million secured revolving asset-based loan facility for Sears Canada.

Goodmans maintains its top-tier M&A status this year. Under Stephen Halperin, the firm has worked on significant cross-border transactions involving Canadian targets and foreign investors/acquirers, and in many high-profile domestic M&A transactions. Its prominent lawyers include Jonathan Lampe, a former general counsel of the Ontario Securities Commission and past chair of the Commission's Securities Advisory Committee. A competitor refers to Halperin and Lampe as "two very good M&A lawyers".

In 2011, Goodmans represented Newmont Mining in its acquisition of all of the outstanding shares of Fronteer Gold for $2.3 billion. The deal was done through a court-approved plan of arrangement, which expanded Newmont Gold's presence in North America. The assets acquired included Fronteer's interests in the Northumberland and Sandman projects in Nevada.

Goodmans also represented BMO Capital Markets and Bank of America Merrill Lynch, the joint lead financial advisers to TMX Group, which owns the Toronto Stock Exchange, in connection with the LSE's $3.7 billion merger bid. The bid failed because it could not get two-thirds shareholder support from TMX.

The 12 partner team at Goodmans is led by Carla Salzman and Ira Berg.

Last year Salzman acted for Dexia Credit Local and Norddeutsche Landesbank Girozentale as lenders to Balfour Beatty on its bid for the St Thomas and Quinte Consolidated Courthouse BOTs (build-operate-transfer) projects.

Salzman and Berg were also called in by Dundee Kilmer Developments in regard to their bid for the athletics village in Ontario which is being prepared for the Pan American and Parapan American Games in 2015.

In the power sector, the firm was also kept busy advising on no less than six project financings related to new solar projects for Nord Bank and Deutsche Bank. For the former the firm acted on the financing of two new projects developed by SunEdison and SkyPower. In December 2010 the team also acted for Deutsche Bank on four other projects by SkyPower. The combined value cost of all six projects came to $210 million.

Goodmans' 17-strong restructuring team, which includes 11 partners, maintains its dominance in the Canadian market. "Nobody can doubt their credentials," says one competitor. The firm had one of its busiest years for some time, with filings coming in from Toronto, Québec, British Columbia and Calgary. Jay Cafargini, who heads the corporate restructuring group, was named by a number of peers as a standout in the field. However, the team also had to deal with the loss of prominent partner David Bish to Torys.

In one of the Canadian broadcasting industry's largest ever restructurings, Goodmans represented the Ad Hoc Committee of the 8% Noteholders of Canwest Global Communications in connection with the C$2 billion ($2.1 billion) purchase of all of its broadcasting assets by Shaw Communications. Canwest Global was Canada's largest media conglomerate and the deal is one of the first restructurings filed under the new amendment to the Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act (CCAA).

Goodmans also represented the Ad Hoc Committee of Noteholders of AbitibiBowater and its subsidiaries in the company's restructuring of over $6 billion of liabilities and emergence from CCAA and US Chapter 11 protection. AbitibiBowater is a global leader in forest products, which owns or operates wood and paper mills and processing facilities in the US, Canada and South Korea. Unsecured creditors received common shares of the restructured AbitibiBowater in payment for allowed creditor claims listed on the Toronto and New York stock exchanges.