Announcing our 2026 Literacy Champion, Tom Liston!

LCNB is holding its annual Literacy Gala Dinner and Auction on Tuesday, October 6th at the Delta Fredericton, and we are thrilled to announce our 2026 Literacy Champion: Tom Liston!

We hope you will join us in celebrating Tom’s many accomplishments on October 6th. Tickets are $150 each or $1,200 for a table of 8. Tickets can be purchased by contacting the Literacy Coalition of New Brunswick at lcnb@nbliteracy.ca or (506) 457-1227.

Thomas (Tom) Liston is an accomplished finance professional, corporate director, and strategic advisor, and is the founder of Water Street Capital, an Investment and Advisory firm. He currently serves on the Board of Directors for two public companies: as the Audit Chair of WELL Health Technologies (WELL-TSX) and Tantalus Systems Inc (GRID-TSX), providing strategic guidance to those companies. He also serves on the Board of Directors of the World’s Oldest Basketball Court (a non-profit), Opportunities New Brunswick (a Crown Corporation) and Saint Andrews Brewing Company (private company). He is Chair for the UNB Faculty of Management Board of Advisors.

Mr. Liston began his career with Yorkton Securities as a Research Analyst covering public Software and IT Services companies. In 2003, he joined Versant Partners in the same role and was quickly promoted to Director of Research while maintaining his coverage of technology companies.

In 2012, Versant Partners’ team was acquired by Cantor Fitzgerald, where Mr. Liston served as Director of Canadian Research and covered the technology sector. Mr. Liston has received more StarMine stock picking awards than any other technology analyst and has been consistently ranked among the top technology analysts in several surveys, including StarMine, Brendan Wood, Greenwich Associates, and Reuters.

After his Equity Analyst career, Mr. Liston became a Managing Partner at Difference Capital, a technology-focused venture capital firm. In his venture capital role, he is responsible for leading investments in Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), FinTech, eCommerce, and Healthcare IT fields.

A dedicated community leader and active volunteer, Mr. Liston is currently leading an $18 million fundraising campaign as the Chair of Fundraising for the restoration of the World’s Oldest Basketball Court in St. Stephen, New Brunswick. He has actively guided UNB’s Student Investment Fund (SIF) for over two decades and actively serves on the UNB Faculty of Management Advisory Board. His philanthropic efforts extend to the MLSE Foundation, where he has raised over $100,000 as a member of its President’s Club. Alongside his wife Krista, he has contributed to Canada Basketball and is a member of its Podium Club. Additionally, he was a top 100 fundraiser out of 7,000 riders in his first two years of the Ride to Conquer Cancer, raising over $23,000 and cycling over 400km. He is highly active in youth sports, coaching for the North Toronto Soccer Club and the North Toronto Huskies Girls Rep basketball teams, specifically working with the U15 and U19 divisions.

Mr. Liston is a Chartered Financial Analyst charterholder. He completed a Bachelor of Business Administration degree (Finance Concentration) from the University of New Brunswick in 1996 and a Master of Arts in Economics and Finance from Queen’s University in 1998. He was a recipient of UNB Faculty of Management’s Certificate of Achievement in 2017 and was recognized with the Proudly UNB Alumni Award of Distinction in 2020.

He lives in Toronto, Ontario and St. Andrews, New Brunswick with his wife Krista and their two children.

We are excited to be honouring Tom Liston at our upcoming Literacy Dinner and Auction!