The board of directors of Canada's Dundee Corporation, majority owner of DundeeWealth, said it could not "respond positively" to the hostile C$2.4 billion ($2.38 billion) offer by CI Financial Income Fund, one of Canada's biggest mutual fund companies, for money manager DundeeWealth. It is a 59 per cent premium over the friendly offer made by Bank of Nova Scotia last week. Scotiabank announced plans to invest C$608 million in DundeeWealth to invest in the Toronto company that operates the Dynamic Mutual Funds network. Scotiabank said it would pay $348 million for 18 per cent of DundeeWealth in a new stock issue. That deal gave Scotiabank an option to boost its position to 20 per cent and possibly to buy a controlling stake. It would also pay C$260 million to acquire Dundee Bank of Canada, a unit of DundeeWealth. The CI bid, announced after stock markets closed on Monday, would allow it to add new customers and mutual fund assets that better position it against bank-owned fund companies. CI does not have the same amount of assets under management or the network of branches as some of the bank-owned mutual fund managers. Dundee Wealth has $62.6 billion under management and administration, and provides savings deposits, mutual funds and other financial services through 1,750 advisers. It said it continued to seek approvals for Scotiabank's plan and declined to comment on the CI bid. CI Financial is an independent, Canadian-owned wealth management company with C$95.4 billion in assets under management. The trust, which is more than a third owned by insurer Sun Life Financial sells mutual funds through its wholly owned subsidiaries CI Investments and Assante Corporation.