Katherine L. Kay

First Year of Call
Ontario, 1988

Areas of Practice
Commercial Litigation

Description
Katherine Kay is a partner in the Litigation & Dispute Resolution and Competition & Foreign Investment Groups. She has served on the firm’s Partnership Board and Executive Committee, and is on her third tour of duty on the Management Committee in the Toronto office.

Katherine’s litigation practice is concentrated on complex commercial litigation, often involving the interplay between regulatory, civil and criminal law regimes, and across multiple jurisdictions (within Canada and internationally). She is consistently ranked at the highest levels of the most recognized legal ranking publications. Chambers Global quotes client feedback that “she is always on top of her game – outstanding expertise, energetic, insightful and very practical”; and as “virtually insurmountable in the area of competition litigation. She is extremely bright, very responsive and has a good litigation sense.” Katherine was described in the Global Competition Review’s Country Survey: Canada as one of Canada’s “headline competition litigators” and as “among the most talented and well-regarded in the country”.

A major focus of Katherine’s practice is defence of class actions, where she has extensive experience in a wide range of cases, including competition, securities, financial services, product liability, franchise and consumer cases. Her class action practice emphasizes the key aspects of formulating and coordinating strategic responses, often working very closely with counsel in the United States, Europe, Asia and other jurisdictions; coordinating and directing multiple class actions across several Canadian jurisdictions; vigorous and highly effective advocacy before the relevant courts and tribunals; and negotiating, securing court approval and implementing settlements where appropriate.

Katherine’s practice includes high stakes commercial litigation and arbitrations in various jurisdictions. As part of her practice, Katherine regularly conducts corporate investigations across a range of areas, including alleged financial misconduct, accounting, securities, corruption and competition issues. Katherine acts for clients in regulatory and criminal proceedings arising from enforcement investigations. She has extensive advocacy experience before all levels of trial and appellate courts in Ontario, British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Québec, the Yukon Territory, the Federal Court of Canada, and the Supreme Court of Canada. She appears frequently before the Competition Tribunal, the Ontario Securities Commission, and other regulatory bodies.

Professional Activities
Katherine is a member of the Canadian Bar Association, the Antitrust Law Section of the American Bar Association, the International Bar Association and the Toronto Lawyers Association. Katherine was the Vice Chair of the Modern Advocacy Task Force established by The Advocates’ Society (2021), and currently serves on the Board of Directors of The Advocates’ Society.

She is the past Chair of the Enforcement Practices and Procedures Committee and past Vice Chair of both that committee and of the Criminal Matters Committee of the Competition Law section of the Canadian Bar Association. She is also a past member of the Joint Committee on Court Reform in Ontario.

Katherine is a sought-after speaker at continuing legal education and professionalism seminars in the areas of competition, securities, commercial litigation, advocacy and professional development. She has lectured at Osgoode Hall Law School, University of Toronto Law School, Queen’s University, the Bar Admission Course of the Law Society of Ontario and the Ontario Centre for Advocacy Training.