Important notice regarding upcoming changes to Trading Functionality

As of June 28, 2021 the CIBC Imperial Investor Service electronic brokerage service will no longer be available, and all Imperial Investor Service investment transactions will need to be facilitated through your CIBC advisor. You will still be able to sign in to your IIS account online to monitor your account and get real-time market updates, transfer funds and products, and get information on investment issues and corporate news.

Notice of change to the Imperial Investor Service Account Agreements and Disclosure Booklet

Canadian securities regulators have recently amended our regulatory obligations, including those relating to conflicts of interest, so we are updating and expanding our relationship disclosure information to you. Effective June 30, 2021, the following disclosures will be added to the CIBC Imperial Investor Service Account Agreements and Disclosures Booklet.

We take steps to identify material conflicts of interest that we reasonably expect to arise between you and our firm or between you and each individual acting on our behalf, as we did before the recent regulatory amendments. We will respond to each such conflict by avoiding, controlling or disclosing it to you.

The CIBC Code of Conduct applies to all employees, contingent workers and directors of Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce and its wholly-owned subsidiaries. This and other CIBC Imperial Investor Service policies set out how we identify and address or avoid conflicts of interest.

We want to make sure that you are informed about potential material conflicts, the potential impact to you and how we have addressed them in your best interests.

Scope of services

  • The CIBC Imperial Investor Service division of CIBC Investor Services Inc. offers full-service brokerage services, but the service and advice options differ by type of security. Your CIBC advisor will only recommend or solicit purchases in respect of an approved list of mutual funds, fixed income, structured notes and deposit products, which is comprised exclusively of issuers that are related or connected to the CIBC Group of Companies. We will assess the suitability of any transaction in other types of securities that you direct or transfer into your account, and your CIBC advisor will provide advice that is in your best interests, but the range of alternatives considered or recommended by your CIBC advisor will be limited to those on the approved list of proprietary products and the advisor cannot recommend or solicit purchases in products offered by third parties. More information on the types of issuers that appear on the approved list can be found in the Relationships with Related and Connected Issuers Disclosure section of the Booklet.
  • Your CIBC advisor will only recommend proprietary mutual fund, fixed income, structured notes and deposit products. Therefore, the suitability determination we conduct for you will not consider the larger market of investment products or whether those investment products would be better, worse or equal in meeting your investment needs and objectives. Your CIBC advisor’s recommendations will be based on the reasonable range of alternatives available to your advisor at CIBC.
  • CIBC Imperial Investor Service only recommends securities and products issued or offered by its parent company CIBC or its affiliates (“proprietary products”). Securities and products issued or offered by third parties are available on an exception basis only and only at your direction (i.e. your CIBC advisor cannot recommend you purchase them). We manage this inherent material conflict of interest by:
    • regularly comparing our proprietary products to alternatives available in the market;
    • making a full suite of proprietary investment options available, with competitive rates and investment performance;
    • leveraging affiliates’ advice and services to reduce client costs;
    • having a straightforward selection of available products for your CIBC advisor to assess, understand and monitor; and
    • having robust processes to ensure that the recommendations made by your CIBC advisor are suitable and in your best interest.
  • We may refer you to another member of the CIBC Group of Companies. While CIBC Imperial Investor Service does not receive any referral payments, your CIBC advisor’s annual compensation will take into account referrals among the CIBC Group of Companies. Our compensation plan is structured so that the financial benefit received by your CIBC advisor for referrals is effectively the same as for sales, so that any referral recommended to you will always be in your best interests.
  • As previously disclosed to you, your CIBC advisor’s compensation may be affected by the types of products you purchase or transfer into your account. The controls in place to manage this conflict of interest include:
    • Your CIBC advisor does not receive direct selling commissions in connection with, mutual funds and other proprietary or non-proprietary products, but there is a variable portion of his or her annual compensation that is based on a number of factors, including sales and the achievement of targets.
    • Our compensation plan incorporates service goals and compliance targets and is not primarily based on revenue generation.
    • The compensation that your CIBC advisor receives does not differentiate between proprietary and non-proprietary products.