Good morning. Days after TD Bank’s new chief executive pledged a cultural reset, fresh reports of accounts linked to Jeffrey Epstein underscored how difficult it might be to turn the page. That’s in focus today.

Energy: Alberta is leading an application for a one-million-barrel-a-day pipeline to the B.C. coast, aiming to push it through Ottawa’s new Major Projects Office by 2026 in hopes private and Indigenous partners will build it.

Venture capital: One week after the shocking resignation of Constellation Software Inc. founder and president Mark Leonard for health reasons, his successor sought to assure investors that nothing would change on his watch.

Mining: The U.S. has taken an equity stake in Vancouver-based Lithium Americas, which is building a massive lithium mine seen as key to reducing U.S. reliance on China.

• With the U.S. government shutdown entering its second day, bigger reports such as tomorrow’s payrolls and next week’s consumer price index may be delayed. Investors are shrugging off the political stalemate so far, but markets also don’t love unknowns. Delayed reports complicate bets on the Federal Reserve’s path.

Toronto-Dominion Bank gathered investors on Monday to hear an ambitious promise from Ray Chun, who was named the bank’s chief executive about a year ago.

After a stormy period marked by a money-laundering scandal and an exodus of senior staff – including the accelerated retirement of his predecessor – Chun outlined a plan to restore accountability, curiosity and courage at a bank that has slipped behind its peers, pledging to cut as much as $2.5-billion in annual costs and to return billions more to shareholders.

“Probably the most important thing a CEO does is set the culture of an organization,” he said.

None of those pledges will be derailed by a report circulating just two days later that associates of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein held accounts at TD until 2019, the year of his death and several years after JPMorgan and Deutsche Bank had cut ties. But the disclosure underscores how difficult it could be for Chun to move the bank past its anti-money-laundering deficiencies, which resulted in a guilty plea in the U.S., billions in penalties and a damaging cap on growth south of the border.

In fact, TD’s connection to Epstein’s associates was first reported in 2019, but has been brought back into focus as congressional disclosures have sharpened scrutiny of how banks handled his finances. At the time, a TD spokesperson declined to comment in a Bloomberg story, saying the bank does not share information of this kind publicly “as a matter of policy.”

Even if banks have closed accounts linked to Epstein, the U.S. House Oversight Committee has kept his financial dealings in plain view of lawmakers, the public and the media. Subpoenas have produced personal calendars, messages and a “birthday album” that featured a letter purportedly signed by Donald Trump – which he has denied – alongside names of other prominent figures.

That scrutiny has been cast back over the financial institutions themselves, reviving questions about how major banks handled accounts linked to Epstein and whether adequate safeguards were in place.

Bloomberg reported in 2019 that TD accepted accounts belonging to associates of Epstein after Deutsche Bank cut ties, with at least some of the assets moved to an entity tied to Darren Indyke, a long-time associate who is now an executor of his estate.

In an e-mailed statement yesterday, TD said it has “never banked Jeffrey Epstein.” After his arrest in 2019, the bank added, it “terminated banking relationships with two individuals who were later revealed to be his business associates.” TD did not respond to questions from The Globe about whether those accounts were escalated through its AML systems, or whether those processes differ today.

On Monday, Chun cast cultural reform as the path to sharper financial performance, using the occasion to signal how he aims to rebuild trust in the institution.

That mission will be shadowed, for a time, by the bank’s well-documented shortcomings. And while the Epstein story is unlikely to move investors, it’s a reminder of how missteps in the U.S. can resurface years later in a political theatre that prizes both spectacle and displays of accountability.

Cayo, a wild white shark, has zigzagged up and down the coast of Nova Scotia in recent weeks – travelling about 700 kilometres and likely gorging on seals along the way. One of her most recent pings was on Sept. 20 off the province’s northeast region.

Atlantic Canadians have been seeing a significant increase in white shark sightings. To learn why, The Globe’s Lindsay Jones writes, scientists must play a dangerous game with the apex predators.