Voyageur 54
News for residents of the “11th province”: Canadians abroad.
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Roots Might Be Up for Sale
First the Bay collapsed. Now Roots is looking in the mirror and wondering what it sees.
The company behind those beaver-logo sweatpants and cabin socks said this week it’s hired JPMorgan to run a strategic review, and a sale is on the table. Roots has more than 100 stores in Canada and another 100 partner-run shops in Asia, but its stock has been flat and sales have never hit the targets it promised when it went public in 2017. Revenue last year was $263 million - about half of what the company once imagined projected.
Roots is majority-owned by Searchlight Capital, an international private equity firm, but the brand still feels distinctly, stubbornly Canadian. It dressed our Olympic teams. It sold the idea that sweatpants could be part of a national identity. One retail analyst called it a "powerful but under-monetized heritage brand" - strong emotional equity, weak growth.
If you've got a Roots hoodie stuffed in a closet somewhere overseas, you're not alone. Let’s see if the beaver logo survives a sale intact.
Read more: CP24
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PM Tells AUS the Old World Order Is Done - Let's Build a New One
PM Mark Carney got a 19-gun salute in Canberra on Thursday, then told Australia's Parliament that the global order is "breaking down" and that the two countries need to stick together.
The speech was part pep talk, part pitch. Carney and Australian PM Anthony Albanese shook hands on deals for critical minerals, artificial intelligence, and a new tax and investment treaty that’s designed to make it easier for businesses (and people) to operate between the two countries. Together, Canada and Australia control about a third of the world's lithium, uranium, and iron ore - and Carney wants to co-develop those resources instead of letting the US and China dominate.
Carney called it "variable geometry" - working with smaller groups of like-minded countries instead of waiting for the UN to get its act together. Canada-Australia-India is one example. CPTPP plus the EU is another, bigger ambition.
"We share a common heritage, have developed a common perspective and can build a common future," Carney said. For the growing number of Canadians in Australia, the tax treaty is worth watching.
Read more: CBC News