The insolvency of one of Canada’s largest and oldest contracting firms is having a ripple effect on companies in Sudbury and across Northern Ontario, NorthernLife.ca reported. The Comstock Group of Burlington is under bankruptcy protection and a number of Sudbury-area industrial suppliers, engineering firms, equipment rental and fabrication shops, which worked as service firms on projects in Sudbury and across Canada, have been hit particularly hard. Forty-two Sudbury-area companies showed up on a list of unsecured creditors owed greater than $1,000.

The Canadian province of Quebec has ordered Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd to help pay clean-up costs after a train disaster that killed 47 people and said on Thursday the company has no choice in the matter. The disaster, North America's deadliest rail crash in two decades, destroyed the center of the Quebec town of Lac-Megantic last month after a runaway oil tanker train derailed on a curve and exploded. Crews are still cleaning up the 1.48 million U.S. gallons (5.6 million liters) of oil that spilled. "Let's be clear.

Lone Pine Resources Inc. failed to make a US$10.1-million, semi-annual interest payment on its senior secured notes Thursday, setting the clock ticking on a possible default the could force the natural gas and light oil developer to seek protection from creditors, Stockhouse reported. The company, incorporated in Delaware but headquartered in Calgary, said failure by Lone Pine Resources Canada Ltd. to make the payment will result in default on the 10.375 per cent senior notes maturing in 2017 unless remedied within 30 days.

Canada will shut down the rail operator whose tanker train blew up in a Quebec town last month, killing 47 people, because the firm does not have enough insurance to pay clean-up costs and other damages, a government regulator said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. The Canadian Transportation Agency said it would suspend the operating license of Montreal, Maine and Atlantic Railway (MMA) and its Canadian subsidiary from Aug.

The Canadian subsidiary of Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway, whose train ravaged Lac-Mégantic, got the creditor protection it was seeking, but the Quebec Superior Court judge who granted its request had some harsh words for the railway’s directors, The Globe and Mail reported. Justice Martin Castonguay granted the stay of proceedings against the railway company on Thursday to “avoid judicial anarchy.” However, the judge initially excluded the directors of Montreal Maine & Atlantic Canada from the court’s protection.

The U.S.-based company whose train derailed in Lac-Mégantic, Que., last month announced Wednesday that it has filed for bankruptcy protection in both Canada and the United States, The Globe and Mail reported. Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway issued a statement Wednesday afternoon saying it has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Maine. The Canadian division of the company also filed a petition under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act with the Superior Court of Quebec in Montreal, according to the statement.

Syncapse, the social media marketing management company that had hoped to provide enterprise-level solutions for companies such as Coca-Cola and Johnson & Johnson on Facebook, has filed for Chapter 15 bankruptcy protection in U.S. federal court, Business Insider reported. Syncapse was one of Facebook's "preferred marketing developers," a company that qualifies to serve ads into, and gather analytics from, the social network. The move suggests that the economics of social media marketing, absent being acquired by a bigger company, are more difficult than they may appear.

Rona Inc, Canada's biggest home-improvement retailer and distributor, will close stores, cut jobs and reduce costs in the second phase of a restructuring plan designed to return it to profitability, the company said on Thursday. Rona said it plans to close 11 unprofitable stores; reduce administrative, marketing, merchandising and distribution costs; and cut a further 125 administrative jobs.

Canada's biggest securities regulator accused Ernst & Young LLP of failing to properly audit the financial statements of Zungui Haixi Corp. ahead of the Chinese shoe maker completing a 39.8 million Canadian dollar ($38.1 million) initial public offering in 2009 and listing its shares on the junior Canadian TSX Venture Exchange. The allegations come after the Ontario Securities Commission in December alleged the big accounting firm failed to adequately audit the financial statements of Sino-Forest Corp. between 2007 and 2010.

Amid skyrocketing professional fees, the United States and the United Kingdom have figured out that the self-regulated industry of salvaging distressed companies is in desperate need of rescue. Not so in Canada, the Financial Post reported in a commentary. Consider the four-and-a-half-year winding down of Nortel Networks Corp.