Malo v. The Queen, 2012 DTC 1214 [at at 3588], 2012 TCC 75 (Informal Procedure) -- summary under Inventory

After finding that the taxpayer's losses from his stake in a tree-planting operation could not be deducted by virtue of failing to comply with the tax shelter rules in s. 237.1, Hogan J. stated in obiter dicta that the taxpayer's outlays (three payments of $25,000) represented the cost of inventory (namely, 750 tree sapplings that would not be sold until they matured), rather than current expenses or capital expenditures. Although the taxpayer received three identical itemized invoices for these amounts (allocating $5000 for soil preparation, for example), there was no evidence that the amounts had actually been spent in such a way.