The Vancouver Business Thread

[jollyburger]

PayByPhone just got sold to VW:

https://www.biv.com/article/2016/12/volkwagen-acquires-vancouvers-paybyphone/

[officedweller]

Cadillac Fairview (Ontario Teacher's Pension Plan) selling minority interest in Vancouver holdings (including Pacific Centre) to Ontario Pension Board.

http://business.financialpost.com/person...ching-hands-as-otpp-sells-minority-stake

[jollyburger]

City of North Vancouver the saviours of neighborhood pubs

“For about 40 years or so, neighbourhood pubs were probably a good investment. Right now you could not get a bank to loan you a dollar to invest in a neighbourhood pub,” he said. “They’re just getting hammered.”

http://www.nsnews.com/news/province-hammering-local-pubs-keating-1.8032605

Most of those pubs are stuck in the 80s and are failing because their clientele is dying off. I doubt someone drinking a beer while getting their haircut would ever step in their pub.

[csbvan]

Craft breweries have replaced neighbourhood pubs. Kids are often allowed in, people sit close together and chat with strangers. I don't think it's a bad thing. It's becoming part of Vancouver's identity and the Pacific Northwest identity. Neighbourhood pubs are more of a vestige of English identity.

[memememe76]

I love mine. The Guildford Station rocks!

[officedweller]

Vancouver-based SHOES.com shutting down operations
Kenneth Chan Jan 27, 2017 1:44 pm

...
There were plans to move the SHOES.com headquarters to the recently completed Five Ten Seymour office building at the corner of Seymour and West Pender streets in downtown Vancouver. It was slated to occupy three upper level floors totalling 24,000 square feet.

http://dailyhive.com/vancouver/shoes-com-shutting-down-bankruptcy-january-2017

[Genauso]

BIV.com Shoes.com shuts down immediately

Vancouver-based online shoe retailer Shoes.com announced January 27, without notice, that it would halt operations immediately.

The company has taken all three of its e-commerce properties – Shoes.com, OnlineShoes.com and ShoeME.ca ­– offline. It also closed the doors on its two Shoes.com brick-and-mortar stores, which are in Vancouver and Toronto.

It made its approximately 200 employees aware of the decision early on January 27, and the company said in a release that it will compensate the employees through to the end of the month.

Bye bye downtown Vancouver stations. It was nice gassing up at you

Chevron announced last year it was considering selling off one of the last two remaining downtown stations on West Georgia Street near Bidwell.

That would leave the Esso at Davie Street and Burrard Street as the last downtown gas station standing, although word is a "for sale" sign may soon go up at that location as well.

With a land value of over $36 million, Imperial Oil may sell the Esso station at Burrard Street and Davie Steet, real estate principal Mehdi Shokri told CBC. Once it's gone there would be no more gas stations in downtown Vancouver.

"My understanding is that station is also being marketed so we're likely to have zero in the near future," said Mehdi Shokri of Avison Young Real Estate.

"We've has such a bull market here on the residential land side ... the numbers are getting so incredibly high that gas stations can't make sense of their business model any more," he said.

The land value of the West Georgia Chevron was pegged at $32.8-million by B.C. Assessment earlier this month, more than triple the value of its 2016 assessment of $10.2-million.


Mehdi says the drag that was expected on real estate prices when the 15 per cent foreign buyers tax was introduced this past summer hasn't materialized in the Coal Harbour neighbourhood where the Chevron station is located.

"A block away [developer] Bosa went to market with their Cardero project just after the 15 per cent tax so everyone was looking at that project as a sign of where land and condos could be going," said Mehdi. "They basically sold out that project averaging $1,800 a square foot.

The business of community gardens, like the former gas station site at Davie & Burrard across from that Esso, must be booming.

Also thought you folks would be interested in the $1800 per sqft of Bosa at Cardero.

[osirisboy]

So what's the deal with the former gas station at David and burrard? It's been gone for well over 5 years (maybe 8) I would have thought something would have happened by now. If it's still because of remediation that's ridiculous.

[SpongeG]

Could they build something like this in downtown vancouver?

such a small pic... But i remember seeing some in London where they were built into/under buildings. I don't think I've seen it in north america.

Instead of apartments above though, maybe built it into a parking garage.


allinlondon.co.uk


pbase.com

check out this funky little one somewhere in Paris


panoramio.com

Another Paris one

http://beyonddc.com/log/?p=3047

[WarrenC12]

I can't imagine the long term health effects of living above a gas station, windows open in the summer... gross.

[Changing City]

There were buildings in Downtown Vancouver that had a gas bar underneath a larger building. Vancouver Motors on Seymour was one example https://changingvancouver.wordpress.com/2015/10/19/vancouver-motors-seymour-street-2/ but the current building code, with concerns about potential fire or vapour buildup, doesn't allow a structure like that any more. (1936 Image from Vancouver Public Library collection)

[officedweller]

Vancouver developer committed fraud, BCSC finds
The developer is known for projects such as Grace and Iliad

By Emma Crawford Hampel | Feb. 2, 2017, 10:49 a.m.

A B.C. company and its sole officer and director are guilty of committing fraud and using an investor’s money to pay personal expenses, according to a British Columbia Securities Commission panel.

Brendan James Schouw, known in Vancouver for developing such projects as Grace and Iliad, convinced an investor in November 2009 to invest $1 million in Hornby Residences Ltd., a real estate project in Vancouver. ...

... The BCSC said Schouw then moved a portion of this money into his personal account and spent $75,000 on his personal mortgage and on unrelated company business.

“Those funds were both put at risk and ultimately lost,” the panel said.
...

https://www.biv.com/article/2017/2/vancouver-developer-committed-fraud-bcsc-finds/

[Klazu]

Big news for Vancouver's fintech sector today.

PayPal to buy Vancouver fintech TIO Networks in $304-million deal

One of Canada’s unheralded financial technology success stories is cashing out. Vancouver-based consumer payments processing firm TIO Networks Corp. has been sold to Silicon Valley giant PayPal Holdings, Inc. in a $304-million all-cash deal, 20 years after it was co-founded by Iranian immigrant Hamed Shahbazi.

Paypal will pay $3.35 in cash per share for Tio, just 7 per cent above its closing price Tuesday but a 25 per cent premium over its 90 day average on the TSX Venture Exchange.The deal, expected to close in the second half of 2017, will be completed by way of a plan of arrangement.

“Its a very fair transaction for both sides,” said Mr. Shahbazi. “Shareholders did very well here.”

TIO, co-founded in 1997 by Mr. Shahbazi, 42 when he was a newly graduated civil engineer from University of British Columbia, started life as Info Touch Technologies Corp., as a provider of internet kiosks to retailers and malls. It went public in 1999 with Mr. Shahbazi in charge and his father Mohsen Shahbazi, also an engineer, on the board of directors.

The company grew modestly but steadily through the 2000s, expanding its kiosks to payday loan providers and convenience stores to provide affordable self-service bill payment services aimed at the “underbanked” American consumers. The renamed TIO eventually evolved to provide its services through a cloud-based software platform, Revenues increased from $8-million in 2005 to $40-million in 2013.

But the stock, which traded for less than $1 for most of the 2001 to 2014 period, has tripled since then on the strength of three transformative acquisitions in the U.S. – for Global Express Money Orders, Inc., ChargeSmart USA, Inc. and Softgate Systems, Inc. “That’s been a big part of our focus,” said Mr. Shahbazi.

With the deals the company’s revenue nearly doubled in size from 2013 levels to $74.7-million in its most recent fiscal year ended last July 31 and the company’s bottom line improved, as it booked a $4.2-million profit last year. With the deals, TIO became a leading digital billing and receivables processor that handled more than $7-billion (U.S.) in transactions last year as it expanded its reach to 65,000 retail locations across North America – including Ace Cash Express, the largest chain of payday loan providers in the US and convenience store giant Circle K – and connecting customers to 10,000 billers, including many large wireless and utility companies.

“It’s expensive to be poor and we want to bring financial services to the underserved,” said John Kunze, vice president of PayPal’s digital money transfer business Xoom, which itself was purchased by the Silicon Valley giant for $890-million (U.S.) in 2015. “”Tio is an amazing asset….it’s proven and very scaled. This just helps bring PayPal to a broader market.”

Brent Holliday, CEO of Garibaldi Capital Advisors, a technology-focused boutique investment banking firm who has known Mr. Shahbazi for the past decade, called TIO a “classic Canadian 20-year overnight success story. He added several technology entrepreneurs had gotten their start working at Tio. “It’s been a good training ground and incubator for tech firms in Vancouver.” One of Mr. Shahbazi’s closest associates is BroadBandTV Corp. founder and fellow Iranian immigrant Shahrzad Rafati; he sits on the board of her company, a leading global player in online video recently put on the block by 51 per cent owner, European conglomerate RTL Group.

Mr. Shahbazi, whose stake in TIO excluding stock options is worth $10-million, will stay on in an executive role with PayPal. He cited the company’s “similar vision in terms of financial inclusion” as a reason for choosing to sell the company.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on...rks-in-304-million-deal/article34022924/

[zahav]

BC is still killing it for employment growth. Lots of people thought there wouid be a slowdown, but February was stellar. Unemployment dropped again to 5.1% (lowest in Canada again, for 1-2 years now month after month). The employment growth year over year is 3.6%, after leading in job growth for the past two years as well. Digging deeper into the #s, full time eployment growth was 4.9% year over year (!!), while part time fell 0.8%. That's amazing growth in full time jobs, and Feb 2016 was already growing the fastest in the country over 2015. And Vancouver was 4.7% unemployment, 3rd lowest in the country (after small Brantford and Victoria).

BC had the best % GDP growth, employment growth, retail sales growth, and manufacturing sales growth in 2016. Government should be very pleased with these #s! You can be sure these #s are going to figure prominently in the upcoming election. Lots of people hate Christie Clark and want her out, but my feeling is the province has been on an upward trajectory since 2003 or so, and after years of mediocre to awful economic and employment growth, I feel like the Liberals will successfully leverage this to win again. And if they do, that will mean they are in power for 20 straight years, which I believe would be the longest continuosuly serving provincial party in Canada

[Caliplanner1]

Originally Posted by zahav

BC is still killing it for employment growth. Lots of people thought there wouid be a slowdown, but February was stellar. Unemployment dropped again to 5.1% (lowest in Canada again, for 1-2 years now month after month). The employment growth year over year is 3.6%, after leading in job growth for the past two years as well. Digging deeper into the #s, full time eployment growth was 4.9% year over year (!!), while part time fell 0.8%. That's amazing growth in full time jobs, and Feb 2016 was already growing the fastest in the country over 2015. And Vancouver was 4.7% unemployment, 3rd lowest in the country (after small Brantford and Victoria).

BC had the best % GDP growth, employment growth, retail sales growth, and manufacturing sales growth in 2016. Government should be very pleased with these #s! You can be sure these #s are going to figure prominently in the upcoming election. Lots of people hate Christie Clark and want her out, but my feeling is the province has been on an upward trajectory since 2003 or so, and after years of mediocre to awful economic and employment growth, I feel like the Liberals will successfully leverage this to win again. And if they do, that will mean they are in power for 20 straight years, which I believe would be the longest continuosuly serving provincial party in Canada

For falling unemployment numbers to really make an impact on B.C. "prosperity" inflation will have to fall significantly so as to boost consumer purchasing power parity (PPP) etc..

[zahav]

Originally Posted by Caliplanner1

For falling unemployment numbers to really make an impact on B.C. "prosperity" inflation will have to fall significantly so as to boost consumer purchasing power parity (PPP) etc..

That's not the point, it's comparing BC's #s to the other provinces. Our CPI growth (inflation) is actually lower than most other jurisdictions.

[Caliplanner1]

Originally Posted by zahav

That's not the point, it's comparing BC's #s to the other provinces. Our CPI growth (inflation) is actually lower than most other jurisdictions.

Really!!!....then why is housing affordability a problem across the lower mainland?

[csbvan]

Originally Posted by zahav

BC is still killing it for employment growth. Lots of people thought there wouid be a slowdown, but February was stellar. Unemployment dropped again to 5.1% (lowest in Canada again, for 1-2 years now month after month). The employment growth year over year is 3.6%, after leading in job growth for the past two years as well. Digging deeper into the #s, full time eployment growth was 4.9% year over year (!!), while part time fell 0.8%. That's amazing growth in full time jobs, and Feb 2016 was already growing the fastest in the country over 2015. And Vancouver was 4.7% unemployment, 3rd lowest in the country (after small Brantford and Victoria).

BC had the best % GDP growth, employment growth, retail sales growth, and manufacturing sales growth in 2016. Government should be very pleased with these #s! You can be sure these #s are going to figure prominently in the upcoming election. Lots of people hate Christie Clark and want her out, but my feeling is the province has been on an upward trajectory since 2003 or so, and after years of mediocre to awful economic and employment growth, I feel like the Liberals will successfully leverage this to win again. And if they do, that will mean they are in power for 20 straight years, which I believe would be the longest continuosuly serving provincial party in Canada

The BC Liberals will absolutely use these numbers, but it is Vancouver that is the engine of BC right now. For a major city in Canada to have unemployment at 4.7%? That is amazing. I see this more as a story of Vancouver carrying the province (Victoria as well, but it's the captial, and capital's always have low unemployment), and creating perhaps more jobs than much of the rest of the country combined.

I don't know who, if anyone, to give credit to for that growth. But I wouldn't say that BC as a whole is killing it for jobs growth.

[zahav]

The job growth may be more so in Vancouver, but other areas are growing too. And the thing about the capitals always having low unemployment is not always true (Toronto is 7.1%, Edmonton is 8.3%, Winnipeg is 6.7%, these are all at or above the unemployment rates in their province).

And I was not suggesting I think the BC Libs are responsibile, just saying they will def use it to their advantage.

The low Vancouver rate is also 7 months into the home buyer tax, so shows the sky didn't fall!

I'm surprised by the negativity/suspiciousness from forumers here. 3.6% employment growth is huge, way above other provinces, and lowest unemployment rate of any province for the umpteenth time. And yet the only replies are about how it's not that good, and that it doesn't matter because some things are expensive, and mistakingly how it's concenrated in two cities (even if that were true, doesn't change anything, there are regional differences in every jurisdiction...). In other provinces or cities, people are proud of stats like that (other local forums and national forums are full of city boosters who would love to have stats like this to be happy about). Maybe this is why everyone thinks BC is full of complainers lol people need to learn to have some pride

[Caliplanner1]

Originally Posted by zahav

The low Vancouver rate is also 7 months into the home buyer tax, so shows the sky didn't fall! Maybe this is why everyone thinks BC is full of complainers lol people need to learn to have some pride

You sound like a die-hard Christy Clarke liberal supporter. But be that as it may, lower house prices via that "home buyer tax" has not rendered housing price levels more affordable for the average worker in B.C.'s supposedly booming (low wage?) jobs market.