Joanne Ferstman

Joanne Ferstman is a Chartered Professional Accountant with over 30 years of financial executive management and board expertise. Ms. Ferstman currently serves as a corporate director on several public company boards and is well-versed in the areas of capital markets, mergers and acquisitions, equity and debt financings, financial and operational management, investments, capital allocation, audit committees, and corporate governance.

As a corporate director, Ms. Ferstman is an expert audit committee chair and has chaired or has been a member of multiple board committees. In her role as Board Chair and Lead Director, she is a sounding board for the CEOs she works with on corporate strategy and general business issues; ensures the boards function efficiently and help to recruit and train new directors.    

Ms. Ferstman spent 18 years at Dundee Corporation and its subsidiaries, predominantly as Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, and also as Chief Executive Officer of its capital markets business.  She was the Vice Chair of DundeeWealth Inc. a diversified wealth management public company that managed over $80 billion of assets under management and administration, including the Dynamic Funds family at the time it was sold to the Bank of Nova Scotia in early 2011.  

In these senior financial roles, Ms. Ferstman was involved in all aspects of corporate strategy, including acquisitions and financings, and had ultimate responsibility for all public financial reporting, giving Ms. Ferstman a wide range of expertise in financial restructurings, mergers and acquisitions, operational and financial management (including legal, tax, HR, IT, compliance, investor relations and risk management), business development, and capital markets.  As CFO, Ms. Ferstman oversaw corporate investments and international subsidiaries of the businesses and was regularly Dundee’s nominee on investee company boards.