Jonathan Fleisher

Jonathan Fleisher* is a partner in the Banking & Specialty Finance Group at Cassels. Jonathan’s practice focuses on the commercial finance industry with an emphasis on innovative cross-border transactions and equipment, automotive, and asset finance. He offers niche experience assisting public and private US commercial finance companies with both establishing operations in Canada and purchasing and selling finance and lease companies. Jonathan’s work includes structured finance, public and private securitization, and commercial and consumer leasing issues with a particular focus on the prime and near prime auto lenders and extends to all forms of debt finance including sub-debt, venture financings, convertible debt, and asset-based lending. He also has extensive experience in renewable energy financing projects including solar, co-gen, and retrofit and represents a number of non-Canadian OEMs in both the equipment and automotive sectors. Jonathan is recognized as a leader in his field by such authorities as Best Lawyers in Canada and the Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory. He was recently named as one of the 40 Most Influential Equipment Finance Lawyers in North America by Leasing News and was named Toronto’s Lawyer of the Year for Equipment Finance Law by Best Lawyers in 2022.

Jonathan’s representative work includes having acted for:

• Stonebriar Commercial Finance Canada in its securitization of US$650 million of equipment finance contracts
• A multi-state US bank in the establishment of a non-bank subsidiary
• A top-tier multi-national US bank with a US$200 million lease facility for a Fortune 200 Canadian entity
• An auto leaser portfolio in its securitization for a private issuer
• Lenders, arrangers and borrowers on the lease and debt financings of railcars

Jonathan is an avid lecturer and writer on both a domestic and international level. He is also a prolific writer on topics related to equipment finance and cross-border transactions. Jonathan has recently co-authored the authoritative book Equipment Finance in Canada and completed both the Equipment Finance and Subordinated Debt chapters for Canadian Forms & Precedents, all published by LexisNexis. He has also drafted specific guides for US lenders expanding operations to Canada.

*Services provided through a Professional Corporation