Montreal group proposes new downtown tower for NATO defence bank

QUÉBEC — Montreal’s business community is coming together to sweeten the pot in the city’s bid to host a multinational defence bank, offering several floors in a planned downtown tower for the highly sought-after headquarters.

A consortium of three companies — Sid Lee Architecture and real estate developers Rosefellow and the Tsatas Group — hope their idea will give Montreal an edge as it competes with Vancouver, Ottawa, and Toronto for the Defence, Security and Resilience Bank.

Canada has been selected to host the multinational bank that will provide long-term, low-cost financing for defence projects by NATO members and allies. The federal government, meanwhile, has not yet chosen a host city — and the Ontario government says it has already secured a location in Toronto for the bank’s headquarters.

“We want Montreal to stay in the running,” Martin Leblanc, co-founder at Sid Lee Architecture, said in an interview Thursday. “We’re going to give (Montreal) one more card to play.”

The tower project had already been finalized and was supposed to be a hotel, but if Montreal is named host city, several floors would be repurposed to accommodate the bank. The project is estimated to cost $200 million, with construction to be completed in 36 months.

It was in Montreal in April that representatives from 18 countries selected Canada to host the bank’s headquarters, and competition between cities — particularly Montreal and Toronto — has proven fierce.

In May, political figures in Quebec denounced allegations, first reported in La Presse, that Toronto officials had brought up the sovereignty movement to scare the federal government from choosing Montreal as the bank’s headquarters.

Confronted with the allegations, Ontario Premier Doug Ford at the time told reporters he did not believe in attacking rival campaigns, adding that Toronto is the only Canadian city with the resources to successfully host the bank.

The business consortium proposing the tower in Montreal isn’t the only group trying to entice Ottawa to choose Montreal.

A group co-ordinated through Finance Montréal — the province’s financial cluster that brings together banks, institutional investors, and industry partners — has joined several Quebec politicians in lobbying for Montreal, citing its financial strength and international connections.

Signatories, including public pension fund manager Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, Desjardins, and National Bank, said Montréal’s financial sector was ready to offer immediate support for the bid by tapping into the city’s major banks, access to global financial markets, and strong pools of institutional investors and financial experts.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 18, 2026.

Patrice Bergeron, The Canadian Press