Seafood tycoon John Risley sold art, planes as loan interest spiralled: court filings

John Risley, fields questions at a news conference in Halifax on Friday, Feb.15, 2002. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan

An investment firm owned by seafood tycoon John Risley sold off planes and art in an effort to pay down a US$250-million loan that had ballooned to nearly US$1 billion under punishing interest rates, court documents show.

The story of high-stakes loans and big investments at the hands of one of Atlantic Canada’s best-known businessmen, spelled out in documents submitted to Nova Scotia’s Supreme Court last week, show a company trying to contain spiralling debt while juggling a portfolio of companies in industries ranging from skin care to biofuels.

The tale was no surprise to Quentin Casey, a journalist who wrote a book about the 77-year-old businessman, called “Net Worth: John Risley, Clearwater, and the Building of a Billion-Dollar Empire.”

Casey pointed to a quote in his book from Risley’s longtime “right-hand man,” Stan Spavold.

“He basically said, ‘John will die in his boots, investing aggressively.’ And I think that sort of sums him up,” Casey said in an interview. “When you see that kind of debt, you know, it’s in line with how he has played the game.”

Risley is known for his yacht and impressive mansion in Nova Scotia, and for co-founding Clearwater Seafoods, a company that transformed the Atlantic Canadian lobster industry, Casey said. It soon became one of the largest seafood companies in North America.

He sold the company in 2021 for $1 billion. But instead of enjoying his money in retirement, he kept backing massive projects with global ambitions, including a stalled wind-powered hydrogen energy operation in western Newfoundland.

Risley was in Ottawa in December to drum up support for a deepwater port in the Arctic.

He agreed with Casey that he is not known for playing it safe in business, and he likened his risk-taking to a baseball game.

“You’ve got to accept the fact that the cost of delivering a grand slam every once in a while is that you have some strikeouts,” Risley said Tuesday in an interview. “You just … don’t want too many of them.”

CFFI Ventures is Risley’s holding company, through which he has investments in sectors from energy to electrical supply, including a marine service company based in St. John’s, N.L., and a biofuels company based in Boston.

In 2017, CFFI borrowed US$250 million from a group of companies led by HPS Investment Partners, a private equity firm based in New York City, according to court documents. The loan would give CFFI some cash and allow it to make more investments.

The agreement came with an interest rate of eight per cent a year, plus another five per cent that was “payable in-kind,” the document reads. The rate climbed steadily under certain conditions listed in the agreement, including when CFFI failed to make interest payments.

By September 2025, the interest rate had hit 28 per cent, the court filings said.

Under the increasing interest rates, the US$250-million loan inflated into a debt reaching nearly US$1 billion, the documents said.
CFFI planned to sell off a few major investments and pay off the debt, but the sales never happened, the papers said.

In 2024, looking to cut costs, the company ended its aviation division and sold off two planes: a Cessna and a Bombardier Global 500 jet. It also sold off about $4.1 million worth of art, according to the court documents.

It wasn’t enough.
Earlier this month, the debt owing to HPS Investment Partners from that initial US$250 million loan stood at more than US$776 million, plus some interest, the documents said.

Last week, the company submitted a plan to transfer its assets and much of its debt to new owners, in a numbered company lead by HPS Investment Partners. Risley is not named among the new company’s directors, according to Nova Scotia’s registry of companies.

A judge is expected to rule in April on whether to accept the restructuring plan.

Risley said Tuesday that he cannot comment on the case.

CFFI is also enmeshed in battles with the Canada Revenue Agency, the court filings read. The company has appealed or objected to $331 million worth of “assessments and reassessments” by the federal tax agency. CFFI also owes money to other creditors, including Risley’s longtime associate Brendan Paddick, a businessman from Newfoundland and Labrador, according to the court documents.

The filings say Paddick is owed more than $23 million. Paddick sued CFFI last week, saying he gave the company a “substantial loan” in 2018 that was never repaid. Paddick did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In the meantime, Risley is touting new ventures outside of CFFI, including an energy grid linking Newfoundland, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. He said last week he plans to continue them.

Again, Casey was not surprised.

“He’s just going to do it like Stan Spavold said, probably until the day he drops dead,” Casey said. “It’s just his thing. He enjoys building these companies and investing in these companies and playing a game with big stakes and big rewards.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 24, 2026.

Sarah Smellie and Devin Stevens, The Canadian Press