I'm not out to defend the OSC in any way. I think the Canadian regulation system is a prehistoric relic that needs to be centralized. And I'm sure that they are ineffective.

But are your comparison numbers adjusted at all to figure in the following? It seems to me that you are comparing aples to oranges. There simply is no equivalent of the SEC in Canada.

The Ontario Securities Commission doesn't even represent all of the companies trading on the TSX or Venture exchange. There are 13 different securities regulators in Canada, the largest being the Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta Securities Commissions. A lot of the juniors and even some of the larger companies are officially registered in a different province than Ontario, and under other securities commissions. OSC has the power to halt trading of any publicly traded company in the province of Ontario -they can halt the trading of a company from B.C. or Alberta on the TSX, and that's about it. They don't have the teeth to prosecute. That's up to whatever province the company is located in. In this case they can do something more because the individuals involved in Agoracom reside in Ontario, and no doubt trade a lot in the various stocks they promote on their website.

To make your numbers meaningful, you would have to add in the number of prosecutions for ALL of the provincial securities commissions. You would also have to factor in the size of the NYSE/Amex/OTCBB versus the TSX/Venture Exchange.

I think you are right, but for the wrong reasons. We desperately need something in Canada that can be compared to the SEC. It simply doesn't exist.