Failed logistics startup GetSwift’s cofounders, Bane Hunter and Joel Macdonald, have been banned from being firm administrators in Canada for all times.
The bans come 4 years after the pair moved to North America as their ASX-listed enterprise disintegrated amid authorized motion and relisted in British Columbia.
The BC Securities Fee (BCSC) final month positioned everlasting bans on Hunter and Macdonald from working within the British Columbia (B.C.) funding market.
The choice comes within the wake of Federal Courtroom penalties in Australia in 2023 that noticed Macdonald banned from operating firms for 12 years and Hunter for 15 years.
They have been additionally fined $1m and $2m respectively. The fines stay unpaid.
The duo, who now reside within the USA, are completely prohibited from being a director or officer of an organization in B.C. They’re additionally banned from buying and selling in or buying any securities or derivatives, except by means of a registered seller who’s been given a replica of the ban. The BCSC sanctions are replicated throughout most of Canada.
GetSwift moved to B.C. in 2020, altering its title to GetSwift Applied sciences, then went into voluntary liquidation in 2022. The corporate had raised A$104 million whereas on the ASX after which transferred A$80 million abroad. The liquidation meant not one of the buyers’ funds may very well be recovered.
A subsequent class motion in Australia noticed buyers obtain 1 cent within the greenback.
The BCSC issued a stop commerce order towards GetSwift in 2022 as a result of it had not filed accounts below its steady disclosure legal guidelines.
Hurt to buyers
In imposing bans, the BCSC panel stated the pair have been “instrumental in GetSwift’s misrepresentations to Australian buyers and in redomiciling GetSwift’s enterprise to British Columbia. [Their] conduct resulted in hurt to buyers.”
The push to ban each males was commenced by BCSC govt director Peter Brady in Might 2025.
Bray’s submission to Bane Hunter was blunt.
“The seriousness of your conduct was exacerbated by the truth that your actions have been ‘insidious’, ‘tough’, and the results of a deliberate scheme authored by you as “ringleader” and GetSwift’s most senior officers motivated by monetary acquire. You additionally acted aggressively towards any GetSwift staff who insisted that GetSwift ‘act prudently and adjust to the norms of regulating disclosure’,” he wrote.
“In actual fact, it was discovered that you just bullied these people. Your actions went past mere bullying, nonetheless, on account of your “laser-like concentrate on creating wealth” for your self and your co-respondent Macdonald. If creating wealth ‘concerned breaking the regulation regulating monetary markets, or exposing GetSwift to 3rd celebration legal responsibility, that was of little concern to [you].’ Lastly, after being caught having achieved simply that, you gave no acknowledgment that you just had acted improperly, confirmed no contrition or regret, and in reality, there was proof of the alternative.”
Hunter, primarily based in New York, engaged with the BCSC, looking for extensions in responding, altering attorneys, after which arguing over jurisdictional points and procedural equity. His counter arguments included reputational harm and that the proposed ban relied on historic Australian Federal Courtroom findings, when there was no subsequent enforcement or conduct suggesting threat in Canada, which demonstrated “rehabilitation and powerful governance reforms”.
“If the Government Director depends principally on a international resolution, elementary equity requires full disclosure of the international tribunal’s findings, a possibility to rebut or clarify them, and an evidentiary course of that enables the respondent to place in context any factual findings from the international resolution,” a abstract Hunter’s submission to the panel stated.
“The reputational penalties of a ban are fast and irreversible: employment prospects worldwide, potential to assist dependents, {and professional} repute could be destroyed even the place the BC nexus is skinny. The Fee shouldn’t take such a drastic measure with out clear and convincing proof of current or impending threat to BC markets.”
It was famous that regardless of itemizing GetSwift in Canada, Hunter “by no means been bodily current in BC, has no intention to take part in BC markets, and there’s no proof of BC buyers being affected,” submissions to the BCSC stated.
Hunter argued that the general public curiosity didn’t assist a blanket ban and it was not proportional. He requested that no market prohibition order towards him or, if it was, that or not it’s restricted to British Columbia.
Whereas Bray tracked Macdonald down to 3 addresses in Florida, together with one in Miami, he didn’t reply earlier than the panel determined to additionally ban him on October 23.
The Australian case
The Australian case that fuelled Bray’s submissions was made by Federal Courtroom Justice Michael Lee in 2021. The 868-page judgment outlined how the corporate broke the ASX’s steady disclosure legal guidelines 22 instances.
Hunter was the CEO and chairman, Macdonald, a former Melbourne Demons AFL participant, was GetSwift’s former MD and a director.
GetSwift emerged in 2015 out of McDonald’s alcohol supply startup Liquorun. Inside a yr it listed on the ASX at 20 cents a share, elevating $5 million.
Inside two years its actions would result in the ASX to tighten its market disclosure necessities in 2018. The corporate raised greater than $104m as a public firm.
Australia’s company regulator, ASIC, took the enterprise and its administrators to court docket for misleading and deceptive conduct in 2019, alleging the corporate made deceptive statements to the ASX..
Justice Lee discovered “what could be described as a public-relations-driven strategy to company disclosure on behalf of these wielding energy inside the firm, motivated by a want to make common bulletins of profitable entry into agreements with numerous nationwide and multinational enterprise shoppers.”
When Lee handed down $18 million in fines and the bans, he berated the 2 males as “representing the unacceptable face of startup capitalism”.
Hunter was “knowingly concerned” in 16 of twenty-two steady disclosure breaches and 29 situations of deceptive and misleading conduct. For Macdonald it was 20 of the 22 disclosures and 33 situations of deceptive and misleading conduct. Each males breached their director’s duties.
Neither Hunter nor Macdonald took half within the Australian hearings, having left the nation.
GetSwift introduced to the ASX in September 2020 that it might to re-domicile within the US. It did so in 2021, itemizing on Canada’s NEO trade in January of that yr.
The share value went from CAD$2.05 to $0.07 cents when buying and selling was suspended 19 months later in July 2022. The corporate filed for Chapter 11 chapter within the US with a market cap of CAD$2.155m.
On the similar time, GetSwift’s Australian subsidiary was handed to liquidators. In doing so, Bane and Macdonald broke an enterprise to a different Federal Courtroom decide after they moved abroad. The duo probably confronted contempt of court docket proceedings, however no motion has been taken.
Justice Lee stated in his his 70-page penalty judgment that: “neither Mr Hunter nor Mr Macdonald have proven the slightest diploma of regret or contrition, nor have they made any acknowledgment they behaved improperly. Moreover, ASIC has been unable to discover the place all the cash raised from buyers went.”
Lee famous that following that 2021 ruling the “insouciance” of the duo “was mirrored within the reality that there have been no adjustments to the composition of the board even at this late stage”.
The pair remained of their roles, and Hunter pocketed $1,791,328, of which 46% was “efficiency associated” and Macdonald, $1,616,019, with 51% of his remuneration additionally “efficiency associated”.
GetSwift posted working losses in yearly its existence.
When Federal Courtroom decide Bernard Murphy permitted a seperate class motion settlement towards GetSwift in early 2023, he described it as “an sad day” for buyers who obtained round 1 cent within the $1, calling what occurred at GetSwift a “scandalous episode in company misconduct”.
Macdonald resurfaces, then vanishes
Earlier than the BCSC listening to, Joel Macdonald made a short reappearance on social media in mid-2025, launching a YouTube channel below his title, the place he provided to be a startup mentor.
“When you’re somebody who’s been overwhelmed down, in a darkish spot, rebuilding or simply desires to have a large crack on a world scale, then this channel is for you,” Macdonald stated within the 23-minute monologue titled “I LOST $200M…and it nearly KILLED me”.
Joel Macdonald within the now hidden YouTube video.
“I used to be 30, I used to be on high of the world, I used to be certainly one of Australia’s youngest public firm CEO’s, firstclass (flights), greatest eating places, younger wealthy record after which BOOM! all the things vanished,” Macdonald stated.
He loses his girlfriend, firstclass way of life, and cash, and slides into ingesting, anger, melancholy and suicidal ideas.
“The craze I felt inside me that it was throughout was insane,” he recounted.
“There have been darkish moments once I simply wished to finish all of it. That was the one approach I may see that the ache may go away.”
He described what occurred as “the last word MBA”.
“The ultimate realisation was I wasn’t truly that completely happy once I was value $200 million,” Macdonald stated.
“What truly bought me excited was the lead as much as that the constructing course of, the artistic course of, the constructing with your mates.”
He promised extra, however the video has now been set to non-public and Macdonald’s YouTube account – “Performed soccer. Constructed and exited just a few firms. Now constructing/investing in Crypto, AI & Media” – with 217 subscribers now has no public content material.
GetSwift Inc went on to promote its software-as-a-service property in October 2022 as a part of its Chapter 11 chapter proceedings for US$5.3 million, together with US$1m in liabilities. The enterprise now operates out of Denver, Colorado.
