Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  Yes, that's what I'm talking about. With the example I gave of a company that was profitable before the recession losing money in the next two years, that's just time. It's not a structural problem of the company. It's a company that is well managed, that has proven it can be suc

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  No, it's different, actually. Let's take a company, a larger company in this case, because these would be Canadian businesses. Usually it's a company that would have an operating or term facility of about $100 million and over. The financial institution that's leading this synd

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  I would not say it exactly like that. In fact, it's the risk.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  With pleasure. I'll try to make it as simple as possible. Granting financing is an art, not a science. There's a difference between the two. It isn't done in a mechanical way. Somewhere, a human being makes a decision, particularly at BDC. Like any other financial institution, w

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  In the past, Mr. Bouchard, we haven't offered any loan guarantees. There are other loan guarantee programs, but BDC did not provide loan guarantees. We're starting to offer them for operating loans as of now. I'm going to go back to the office to check the answer to that excellen

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  You're right, it's getting less complicated, actually, as we work on it. Even for us at the very beginning, we said, what is this? Now we're getting it. I'm going to go back to your comments, Mr. Allen, about stuff on a balance sheet. As a matter of fact, I like that: stuff on a

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  We are different, because BDC has always taken a long-term view on all of our investments. We currently have about 150 technology companies. I'm talking about high-tech companies—in biotechnology, information technology, nanotechnology. These are companies that represent the futu

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  The difficulty we sometimes have is in actually making sure banks don't give us their problem. So the uptake is a little bigger than it was a year ago. Having said this, we sometimes just have to say to the financial institution that we cannot help in this particular case. Most

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  The answer is definitely yes. Mr. Allen, I really appreciate your question. BDC, by its act, was asked to be complementary. Complementary means that you're doing what other financial institutions are perhaps not willing to do, and complementarity also evolves with the context. O

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  Maybe I can try it, and Benoit can add to it. When it comes to the difficulty that we're seeing at the moment, we were caught by the fact that our next-door neighbour was the largest trading partner of a lot of our clients. I would say that of the exporters that we have in our p

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  BDC's rate policy varies with the risk that each case represents. Each transaction is reviewed based on risk. A number of criteria are used to determine the risk that a business presents: the sector, management team, financial situation, project effectiveness, etc. Rates are base

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  It can vary. More often than not, it's a floating rate. Most of our entrepreneurs prefer to have a floating rate because it's more advantageous for them. It ranges from prime to prime plus 5% or 6%.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  The prime rate plus 5% or 6%. Today the prime rate is about 4%. Four plus six equals 10; so the maximum rate is 10%.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  That's correct.

Subcommittee on Canadian Industrial Sectors committee  No. The bank is required to be financially profitable. BDC has been profitable since its mandate was amended. Over the years, it has returned dividends of $150 million to the Canadian government. When it incurs losses, it has to absorb them. The Canadian government chooses to inv