Overview of facts. The two individual taxpayers devised a scheme to: generate artificial capital gains of $110 million in some home-grown companies; pay the supposedly resulting capital dividend accounts (CDAs) of $55 million to another company (1915); generate artificial capital losses in the home-grown companies to offset their capital gains; effectively sell negotiated portions of the CDA to 3rd-party purchasers by having them subscribe for preferred shares at a 21% premium to their redemption amount with the shares' redemption amounts effectively being flowed out to the 3rd parties as purported capital dividends; and then pocketing such subscription "premiums" as capital dividends paid out to them. A more detailed summary of the facts is under s. 83(2).
Gains generated on income account. After finding that the daylight loan used in the transactions and the promissory notes issued in the transactions issued in the transactions generating capital gains were not shams, and finding that the share premiums generated by 1915 were business income, Noël JA found that the "gainmaking" shares which were acquired for the purpose of their immediate resale so as to give rise to such gains were acquired on income account, given that "property acquired for resale is held on account of revenue" (para. 73).
Elections were shams. Given that these shares were acquired on income account, the subsidiaries in making capital capital dividend elections to flow out their CDAs to 1915 were making a misrepresentation which rendered such elections shams, and similarly the subsequent capital dividend elections by 1915 also were shams.