The Ontario Securities Commission has opened an investigation into embattled licensed cannabis producer CannTrust Holdings Inc., the company confirmed in a statement Thursday.
A series of media reports last week alleged that former CannTrust CEO Peter Aceto and former company chairman Eric Paul knew about the unlicensed growing prior to Health Canada issuing its non-compliance order against the company. “We reached out to them…. We did this voluntarily.… Everything we are doing is voluntary because it is the right thing to do,” he said of the company’s efforts to co-operate with regulators.
According to the OSC’s website, it combines policing and financial know how to “investigate and prosecute serious violations of the law using provisions of the Securities Act and Criminal Code.” In Thursday’s statement, CannTrust said that it would “likely” miss its deadline of Aug. 14, 2019 to file an upcoming interim financial report “for the three and six month periods ending June 30, 2019.”