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Toronto Hotel scrapping the Trump name

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The Trump International Hotel and Tower opened in downtown Toronto in 2012.
Photo: GettyImages

President Trump’s brand will no longer tower over Toronto.

Under a deal announced Tuesday, the new owner of the 65-story Trump International Hotel and Tower, which fell into receivership last year and became the scene of occasional anti-Trump protests, will erase the president’s name from the building.

In a statement, the new owner, JCF Capital, said it had reached an agreement to end the Trump Organization’s contract to manage the hotel and condominium complex.

Both sides, which declined to reveal the transaction’s terms, sought to put a positive spin on it.

Jay Wolf, the president of JCF, said the Trumps had been “exceptional partners, and we hope to have the pleasure of working with the Trump Organization again in the future.”

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Eric Danziger, Trump Hotels’ chief, said, “We are pleased to have reached this agreement with JCF and have enjoyed our relationship with them as the new owners of this property.”

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Mr. Trump never held an ownership stake in the building, which has been plagued by construction problems, cost overruns and evidence of poor occupancy rates.

A spokeswoman for Mr. Wolf, who lives in Los Angeles but is from Canada, declined to comment on why the companies had parted ways. But evidence in a Canadian court suggested that the hotel, in Toronto’s financial district, struggled to attract business in a city where vacancies at other luxury hotels are often scarce.

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Mr. Trump’s political life may also be a factor. Hollywood stars and film studios shunned the hotel last year during the Toronto International Film Festival. Before Mr. Trump’s move into politics, it was a prominent venue for news conferences and celebrity sightings.

The tower was built by the Toronto investor Alex Shnaider, who was born in Russia and made his fortune through steel mills in the former Soviet Union.

In addition to offering traditional residential condominiums, Mr. Shnaider tried to use Mr. Trump’s name and image at the height of his “Celebrity Apprentice” fame to sell hotel rooms as investment condos.

Those investors, many of them recent immigrants, lost much of their money — conspicuous in Toronto, where real estate investments have climbed in value.

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