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Haywood Securities
John Tognetti and a group of partners founded Haywood Securities in 1981, building an employee-owned investment dealer that would outlast the 1983...
Haywood Securities
John Tognetti and a group of partners founded Haywood Securities in 1981, building an employee-owned investment dealer that would outlast the 1983 recession, the Bre-X collapse, and the 2008 financial crisis without consolidating into a chartered bank. The firm remains headquartered in Vancouver with additional offices in Toronto and Calgary, positioning it at the geographic center of Canadian mining finance. President and CEO Peter Snell, a veteran of the firm's institutional sales desk, now leads an organization where senior professionals collectively hold the equity — a structure that aligns the house's risk with its clients' outcomes. Haywood's core strategy revolves around originating, underwriting, and distributing securities for small- to mid-cap resource companies, primarily in precious metals, base metals, and energy transition minerals. The firm's investment banking desk has led or co-led financings for issuers active across Canada, the United States, and Latin America, covering exploration-stage prospect generators through to near-production developers. Beyond pure-play mining, Haywood maintains research and capital markets coverage in energy services, real estate, technology, and healthcare — a diversification that provides counter-cyclical ballast when commodity prices soften. The firm operates a registered retail advisory arm that places these new issues with high-net-worth individual investors, creating a vertically integrated distribution engine that many independent dealers lack. Haywood also manages proprietary investment funds, including flow-through limited partnerships that allow Canadian taxpayers to deduct resource exploration expenditures — a tax-advantaged structure unique to the Canadian market. The firm's professional headcount is not publicly disclosed, but its platform spans institutional sales, trading, research, and corporate finance under one roof. In recent years, Haywood has deepened its involvement in the energy transition space, participating in financings for lithium, copper, and rare-earth explorers that supply the electric-vehicle and grid-storage supply chains. Structurally, Haywood's distinction is its status as one of the last major independent investment dealers in Canada that remains employee-owned and free of bank affiliation. This independence allows the firm to underwrite and make markets in small-cap resource names that consolidated bank-owned dealers — constrained by risk committee mandates — routinely decline. The result is a franchise that functions as a de facto specialist market-maker for the junior mining ecosystem, a role that has compounding relevance as North American critical-minerals policy intensifies.
General information
Firm type
Asset Manager
Year founded
1981
AUM
Undisclosed
Location
Region
North America
Country
Canada
City
Vancouver
Corporate office
Vancouver, BC, Canada
Additional offices
Toronto, ON, Canada · Calgary, AB, Canada
Principals
Peter Snell
President & CEO
Sector focus
Frequently asked questions
Is Haywood Securities a bank-owned dealer or independent?
Haywood Securities is fully independent and employee-owned. The firm was founded in 1981 and has remained structurally separate from any chartered bank, which is uncommon among Canadian investment dealers of its scale. This independence allows Haywood to underwrite and trade small-cap resource equities that bank-owned dealers often avoid due to internal risk constraints.
What is Haywood's primary area of investment banking focus?
Haywood's dominant investment banking vertical is the junior natural-resource sector, encompassing precious metals, base metals, and battery-metals exploration and development companies. The firm also maintains active coverage in energy services, real estate, technology, and healthcare. Its research and capital-markets teams originate and distribute equity financings for issuers primarily listed on the TSX Venture Exchange and the Toronto Stock Exchange.
Does Haywood Securities offer retail wealth-management services?
Yes. Haywood operates a registered retail advisory division that places new issues — including flow-through share offerings — with individual accredited and high-net-worth investors. This vertical integration between its corporate-finance origination and retail distribution creates a captive demand channel that many institutional-only dealers cannot replicate.
What investment stages does Haywood typically target in mining?
Haywood's mining investment banking group engages across the development spectrum, from grassroots exploration to advanced-stage development and small-scale production. The firm's sweet spot is the sub-$500-million market-cap segment where capital access is most constrained. Its equity research analysts cover companies from early-stage prospect generators through to producers with operating mines, primarily in the Americas.
Who leads Haywood Securities?
Peter Snell serves as President and CEO. He rose through the firm's institutional sales and management ranks and now leads the firm's strategic direction. Day-to-day investment banking and research decisions are led by senior managing directors within each coverage vertical, with significant autonomy delegated to sector heads.
How does Haywood source proprietary deal flow in mining?
Haywood sources deal flow through long-tenured relationships with management teams, geologists, and prospectors in Vancouver — the global hub for junior mining finance. The firm's research analysts and investment bankers maintain continuous coverage of the TSX Venture micro-cap ecosystem, often building relationships years before a company requires a public financing. This embedded presence in the Vancouver mining community functions as a proprietary origination network.
Does Haywood manage its own investment funds?
Yes. Haywood manages proprietary investment products including flow-through limited partnerships, which are tax-advantaged vehicles unique to the Canadian resource sector. These funds pool capital to invest in eligible exploration expenditures, passing the associated tax deductions through to Canadian-resident unitholders.
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