Benjamin Bathgate

Practice Areas

Benjamin M. Bathgate is the Chair of the Commercial Litigation Practice Group and Co-Chair of the Blockchain and Digital Assets Practice Group at WeirFoulds LLP. His practice focuses on complex, high stakes fraud, digital asset recovery and commercial litigation. Ben is widely recognized in the crypto industry as the go-to digital asset investigations and recovery lawyer in Canada.

Ben has significant expertise in and regularly advises on matters relating to commercial fraud, injunctions, asset tracing and recovery, internal and government investigations (cross-border and national) and transactional disputes. He has been lead counsel in a number of precedent-setting cases, including cross-border digital asset tracing and seizure proceedings. Ben successfully obtained the first reported Anton Piller Order (Civil Search and Seizure) on cryptocurrency in Canada, a case that was the feature story in Bloomberg Businessweek (May 19, 2022). He speaks and consults regularly on cryptocurrency frauds and asset tracing as part of his cross-border practice, and has interviewed with leading publications in the field including CBC Television, Globe and Mail, CoinDesk, CoinDesk TV, Canadian Lawyer, Yahoo Finance, Bloomberg Law and Bloomberg Business.

Ben is a leading corporate commercial litigator who has built a far-reaching cross-border practice and network, including foreign lawyer contacts, investigators, local and international law enforcement contacts, litigation funders, forensic experts, custodians/monitors and other specialized service providers. Ben’s sophisticated cross-border fraud practice has also helped him develop an expertise in and a network to support investigations of off-shore monetary and digital asset transactions including those implicated in money laundering, sanctions violations and corruption. He prides himself on building cross-disciplinary teams that provide practical, multi-jurisdictional solutions for business challenges facing a diverse global client base. These foreign and domestic companies include: banking and financial services institutions; exchanges; MSBs; investment companies/funds; investment clubs; FinTech companies; consumer products manufacturers and distributors; consulates; embassies; insurance companies; land developers; and telecommunications companies.

Ben has been recognized by Lexology Index as a “pre-eminent name of the next generation” and “Future Leader” in Commercial Litigation; by Legal 500 Canada as a “Next Generation Partner” in Dispute Resolution; by the Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory as a “Leading Lawyer to Watch” in Corporate Commercial Litigation and in White Collar Defence & Investigations; and as a “Future Star” by Benchmark Litigation.

Ben has considerable experience representing clients at all levels of court in Canada, including the Court of Appeal for Ontario and the Supreme Court of Canada, and has been lead counsel in a number of precedent-setting cases. He is unique among commercial/civil litigators due to his considerable experience in contempt proceedings and leading private prosecutions (the private laying and prosecution of criminal charges). He appears regularly as counsel in domestic and cross-border disputes, leading teams in complex arbitrations and before various boards and tribunals.

Ben co-authors the Canadian Chapter of Chambers Global’s International Fraud and Asset Tracing Guide (Trends: Cybercrime and Cryptocurrency), and its Anti-Corruption Guide. He is faculty for Osgoode Law School’s Web3, Blockchain and Metaverse Law certificate course: Global Enforcement Trends in Web3. He is a co-author and co-editor of The Essential Guide to Settlement in Canada, a practice manual designed for in-house counsel, which is cited as an authoritative text by the courts. He speaks and interviews regularly on litigation funding issues, particularly as they relate to digital asset recovery. His writing on what is now Ontario’s Apology Act was considered by the Ontario Legislature and in legislative committees.

Professional Memberships

Ontario Bar Association, The Franchise Law Section

Canadian Franchise Association

International Bar Association

International Franchise Association

The American Chamber of Commerce in Canada

The Advocates’ Society

Work Highlights

Crypto Litigation, Fraud and Asset Recovery Experience

Successfully obtained and executed the first reported Anton Piller Order (Civil Search and Seizure) on cryptocurrency (cold storage, ETH) in Canada, and argued Canada’s first case, and one of the world’s first cases, considering attacks against smart contracts (on a blockchain) and legal implications arising from user interactions on decentralized finance (DeFi) trading platforms and Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs);

Lead Canadian counsel in a cross-border case representing a corporate token owner (SOL) in investigating, tracing and prosecuting hundreds of millions (US) in token theft, fraud and market manipulation claims, arising from a CEX/DEX listed token once worth over a billion (US) in total market cap;

Representing investors in the investigation, tracing and recovery from a US $200 million cross-border, investment advisor and trading fraud (BTC) that resulted in the collapse of multiple private investment funds;

Lead Canadian counsel in the cross-border crypto tracing and enforcement investigation arising from the bankruptcy of one of the world’s largest crypto platforms, leading to hundreds of millions (US) in crypto tracing and enforcement work;

Representing loss holders in the investigation, tracing and recovery from a US $40 million cross-border, DeFi Ponzi private investment scheme (ETH) (stablecoin farming; venture capital investments; leverage trading; NFTs) that resulted in the collapse of the fund;

Representing a financial services client in the investigation, tracing and recovery of tens of millions (CDN) in losses arising from a fraudulent DeFi trading platform investment scam and a subsequent ‘token recovery’ scam;

Successfully opposed certification of a class action brought by certain DAO token holders (ETH), arising from a smart contract exploitation, on behalf of a token holder;

Successfully brought a freezing and seizure injunctive claim in a DeFi crypto fraud case involving tens of millions (US) in losses (ETH), on behalf of an anonymous exotic token holder, via a novel wallet assignment argument;

Prosecuting on behalf of investors more than CDN $15 million in claims arising from a cryptocurrency mining fraud (BTC), including obtaining urgent Mareva, interim possession and Norwich injunctive relief and investigating allegations of improper monetary and digital asset transactions with off-shore MSBs and crypto exchanges;

Lead Canadian counsel providing advisory services to a large crypto platform on cybersecurity breaches and hacks that compromised customer data and millions in crypto assets (BTC), and supporting tracing and recovery investigations;

Representing a group of retail loss holders in investigating, tracing and seeking to recover millions in crypto (ETH) based on a rogue developer’s fraudulent DeFi investment platform and a fabricated liquid staking solution;

Representing a group of retail loss holders in investigating, tracing and seeking to recover millions in crypto (XRP; XLM; THETA; BTC) arising from a social engineering scam;

Successfully brought Norwich (third party production, KYC) injunctive motions relating to hundreds of millions (US) in transactions against cryptocurrency exchanges, MSBs, wallet service providers, other financial institutions and data custodians in support of asset tracing and recovery proceedings.

Crypto and Digital Asset Advisory, White Collar and Investigations Experience

Represented several former officers of Sino-Forest Corporation (as second lead partner) before the Ontario Securities Commission in one of Canada’s largest ever securities fraud proceedings, spanning 180 hearing days and relating to CDN $3 billion in Canadian-raised capital;

Lead counsel providing advisory services arising from the Canadian law enforcement and regulatory investigations into Canada’s largest ever cryptocurrency fraud and exchange collapse, QuadrigaCX, with tracing of missing crypto in amounts up to CDN $250 million;

Lead Canadian counsel coordinating with Canadian law enforcement, the U.S. Department of Justice, FBI and INTERPOL on international investigations into and NY criminal indictments arising from DeFi trading frauds in excess of US $55 million (ARB; OP; ETH);

Lead Canadian counsel advising a client group on a cross-border criminal and regulatory investigation, and class actions claims, arising from an alleged DeFi trading Ponzi fraud and pyramid scheme, which involved the minting of unique NFT tokens and claims of losses in excess of US $400 million;

Lead Canadian counsel providing advisory services relating to a U.S. and Canadian law enforcement and securities investigation (SEC and CFTC) into an investment fund Ponzi scheme in the tens of millions (US);

Lead counsel providing advisory services on Canadian law enforcement investigations into a fraudulent DeFi investment platform and a broader investment scam impacting a wide group of Canadian investors, with losses in the tens of millions (CDN);

Lead counsel investigating and advising on criminal and regulatory implications for a digital asset conversion and exchange businesses as part of an alleged money laundering and sanctions evasion case in the tens of millions (CDN), extending to the Caribbean and Middle East;

Successfully defended against injunctive relief seeking the custody, valuation and disposition of tens of millions of dollars in cryptocurrency assets (BTC; ETH) on behalf of a high net-worth individual, defeating arguments on the nature of the digital assets and their inherent risk of dissipation.