{"id":238840,"date":"2025-10-25T08:43:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-25T08:43:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/238840\/"},"modified":"2025-10-25T08:43:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-25T08:43:08","slug":"jpmorgan-plots-expansion-into-banking-for-canadian-tech-firms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/238840\/","title":{"rendered":"JPMorgan plots expansion into banking for Canadian tech firms"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

JPMorgan is recruiting for a managing director for its Canadian ‘innovation economy’ unit.Eduardo Munoz\/Reuters<\/p>\n

U.S. financial services giant JPMorgan Chase & Co. JPM-N<\/a> is making a play to expand banking services to Canadian technology companies, two years after the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank reordered the domestic sector.<\/p>\n

JPMorgan, the world\u2019s most valuable bank by market capitalization, is recruiting for a managing director for Canada for its \u201cinnovation economy\u201d unit after making modest inroads in this country in recent years catering to the banking needs of innovation-driven companies. <\/p>\n

JPM has five dedicated technology bankers in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver and has picked up hundreds of clients in Canada, including legal software vendor Clio. The Vancouver-area company uses JP Morgan for cash management services and has a credit facility with the U.S. lender and fellow U.S. bank, Comerica Inc. <\/p>\n

Inside some of the coolest Technology Fast 50 companies<\/a><\/p>\n

According to its job posting, JPM is looking for a Canadian-based leader to hire and oversee a team \u201cresponsible for supporting the unique needs\u201d of venture capital firms, founders and high-growth, venture capital-backed companies across eight technology subsectors, including enterprise software, climate technology and life sciences. <\/p>\n

Three sources said JPM\u2019s in-house recruiters have blanketed Canadian innovation banking executives with calls in recent weeks to gauge their interest in leading its local practice \u2013 and hitting them up for market intelligence on others in the sector. <\/p>\n

Andrew Kresse, co-head of JPM\u2019s innovation economy unit, said that after taking the role six months ago, \u201cI saw the innovation economy business in Canada and said \u2018We\u2019re doing really well in Canada,\u2019\u201d adding that this country is one of the top 10 innovation markets globally. <\/p>\n

\u201cNow that we have critical mass, we want to have a senior leader in Canada who\u2019s responsible for continuing to build the business and serve more clients,\u201d he said. New York-based Mr. Kresse leads the group with John China, a former president with Silicon Valley Bank, who is in the San Francisco area.<\/p>\n

JPM has operated in Canada for more than 100 years. Its Morgan Bank of Canada was the first foreign bank established here in 1981 and Chase Manhattan Canada received a charter as a Canadian bank a year later. JPM has 600 employees in Canada in five business lines, including investment banking, commercial banking, payments and asset management. <\/p>\n

JPM is entering a crowded space: Canada\u2019s big banks began catering in a more focused way to the particular demands of technology clients in the late 2010s as the sector\u2019s post-credit-crisis renaissance took flight. <\/p>\n

Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce CM-T<\/a> bought technology financier Wellington Financial in 2018 and made it the cornerstone of its innovation banking group. Bank of Montreal BMO-T<\/a> and Bank of Nova Scotia BNS-T<\/a> followed by launching technology and innovation banking groups in 2019, the same year National Bank of Canada NA-T<\/a> started expanding its long-established practice nationally. Then in 2020, Royal Bank of Canada RY-T<\/a> hired former OMERS Ventures managing partner Sid Paquette to consolidate and expand its technology-focused banking practice under the brand RBCx, establishing Canada\u2019s largest bank as the biggest domestic player in the sector.<\/p>\n

The Canadian banks benefited after U.S.-based Silicon Valley Bank, an early specialty technology financier, collapsed two years ago. Several raided SVB\u2019s Canadian ranks, including Toronto-Dominion Bank TD-T<\/a>, which became the last of the Big Five to enter the tech banking space in 2023, while National Bank bought SVB\u2019s Canadian loan portfolio. <\/p>\n

Mr. Kresse said the goal of JPM is to \u201ccomplement the local banks\u201d by pitching itself as the bank of choice for Canadian tech companies as they expand globally, particularly those requiring more lucrative services including advising on mergers and acquisitions, raising large growth and private equity financings or going public. JPM already commands a reputation as one of the world\u2019s top investment banks. It is likely to factor as a leading contender to lead initial public offerings of sizable Canadian private technology companies that choose to list primarily in the United States if the market for new issues continues to warm up.<\/p>\n

JPMorgan\u2019s innovation economy unit started in 2016. It has more than 11,000 clients in 40 markets, with 550 employees in 25 countries. The strategy in Canada is to offer a full range of banking services, including deposit-taking (which it can do as a Schedule II bank in Canada, meaning it is a Canadian subsidiary of a foreign bank), cash management, asset management, credit lines and private banking, plus more specialized offerings catering to the sector including offering venture debt. Industry observers expect JPM to focus on the larger, more advanced Canadian companies, but Mr. Kresse said that isn\u2019t necessarily the case.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor us it\u2019s about simple banking and advising,\u201d said Mr. Kresse. Prospective customers \u201cneed advice on how to scale their business. You\u2019ll want to partner with a firm who is used to working with the top 1,000 investors in the world. You may come to JPMorgan if you are thinking of expanding globally.\u201d <\/p>\n

He said the goal is to fill the role by early next year with \u201csomeone who has been in the ecosystem and knows both the investors as well as the companies. It\u2019s important for us to have a leader who is local in this space.\u201d <\/p>\n

He said the plan is to double JPM\u2019s business and employee count, adding: \u201cWe\u2019ll grow as needed to support our clients and prospective clients. If we see more demand we\u2019ll continue to grow.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: JPMorgan is recruiting for a managing director for its Canadian ‘innovation economy’ unit.Eduardo…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":238841,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,45,49,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,889,890,884,904,885,909,910,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,865,61,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-238840","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238840","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=238840"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238840\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/238841"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=238840"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=238840"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=238840"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}