‘There’s no stopping the industry now’: Democratic control is a big win for marijuana
January 31, 2021
buy marijuana with bitcoins.The industry
is poise for a big shakeup even though the
prospects for passing major changes to
federal policy remain slim.
Curaleaf, America’s largest cannabis
company, put over 16 million shares on
the market overnight and brought in
$300 million — in equity and debt sales
— in under 24 hours. | Hans Pennink/AP
By PAUL DEMKO and NATALIE FERTIG
01/31/2021 07:00 AM EST
The day after Democrats
swept both Senate seats in the Georgia runoff election
— giving them a slim majority and installing
pro-marijuana legalization leaders in the
upper chamber — Curaleaf Chair Boris Jordan
decide to try something big.
“I literally called my bankers and I
said, ‘Guys, I think this is going to be a big
change. Let’s do an [overnight]
offering,’” Jordan recall.
Curaleaf, America’s largest cannabis company,
put over 16 million shares on the market
overnight and brought in $300 million — in
equity and debt sales — in under 24 hours.
The company’s payday foreshadows how
the entire cannabis industry is poised for
growth and consolidation as Democrats take
full control of the federal government.
Companies are positioning themselves for the
greater likelihood that federal cannabis
restrictions will be loosened significantly.
Sales are already booming. Cannabis sales
hit $20 billion last year — a 50 percent jump
over 2019. Legalization continues to spread
across the country, with more than one-third
of Americans now living in states where
marijuana is fully legal.
“There’s no stopping the industry now,” say
Andrew Kline, who recently joined the law firm
Perkins Coie after serving as public policy
director for the National Cannabis Industry
Association. “The bigger players are going to be
interest in acquiring smaller companies and
becoming multi-state operators or expanding
their footprint in different states.”
What’s happened so far?
A flurry of deals and capital raises have been
made in recent weeks, in addition to
Curaleaf cashing in.
Cannabis behemoth Cresco Labs recently
bought Bluma Wellness for $213 million,
giving it a beachhead in the booming Florida
market. There are now more than 450,000
medical marijuana patients in Florida — a
more than 50 percent increase in the last year
— and 310 dispensaries across the state, nearly
100 more than at the start of 2020.
“I think you’re gonna see a lot of [mergers and
acquisitions] coming,” said Bluma Wellness
CEO Brady Cobb, who will join Cresco immediately
and focus on building its Florida business.
“It’s going to be driven by the fact that
institutional capital sees light at the end of
the tunnel for these companies.”
Cresco also recently announced it will raise
$125 million from investors, citing plans to
accelerate its growth. The company was already
soaring ahead of the political shifts: It had
third-quarter revenues of $153 million — more
than four times as much as during the
Democratic-led Senate could clear a path to marijuana legalization
Canadian companies also are eyeing the U.S.
market. Cannabis giant Canopy Growth Corp.
recently announced a deal — contingent on U.S.
legalization — to acquire a big stake in
TerrAscend, which has operations in California,
Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
The deal is similar to Canopy’s arrangement to
buy Acreage Holdings, which has 71 dispensaries
and operations in 15 states, if marijuana
restrictions in the U.S. are lift.
Stock prices for some of the biggest cannabis
companies have skyrocketed in recent weeks.
Acreage’s stock price has nearly doubled since
Democrats won control of the Senate, while
the price of Cresco’s shares have jumped by
more than 30 percent.buy marijuana with bitcoins
“People are scrambling right now, and they’re
taking a calculated risk that federal change
is going to happen in the near term,” Kline say.
What’s the reality on Capitol Hill?
Despite the ebullient feelings among industry
advocates and investors, the likelihood that
Congress will make big changes to federal
marijuana restrictions remains slim. That’s
in large part because Democrats will have a
razor-thin majority and need 60 votes to
pass most legislation.buy marijuana with bitcoins
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For instance, the national pot powerhouse
PharmaCann (“Improving people’s lives
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through cannabis”) offered the town of
Wareham, on the Cape Cod Canal
,money for police details; paid an art conservation company to restore a painting; and put up money for a local
oyster festival, among other sweeteners.
These special benefits — particularly the
police details — seemed to run afoul of the
state’s commitment to right past wrongs
of marijuana enforcement, which was the
thinking behind a requirement that cannabis
businesses have a “Positive Impact Plan” in
order to help areas that were disproportionately
target by marijuana enforcement.
Former Maryland state Del. Cheryl Glenn was
sentence to two years in prison in July for
taking bribes in exchange for introducing and
voting on legislation to benefit medical marijuana
companies. Missouri Gov. Mike Parson’s
administration is the
target of law enforcement and legislative probes into the rollout
of its medical marijuana program.
Genoveva Andrade, who served as Correia’s
chief of staff, pleaded guilty to bribery and extortion charges
in December. Correia is schedule
to go to trial in February, and five marijuana applicants
are expected to testify for the prosecution.
“All government contracting and licensing is subject
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to these kinds of forces,” said Douglas Berman, a
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law professor at Ohio State University who authors
a blog on marijuana policy. But “there are unique
facets to government contracting in [the cannabis]
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space that makes it uniquely vulnerable to corruption.”
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Plenty of lawmakers haven’t been sway,
however.
A planned September vote on the MORE Act was delayed
because moderates worried that voting on weed
without passing another coronavirus aid package
would hurt them on Election Day.
Then came the police killings of Breonna Taylor
and George Floyd this year. By June 2020,
The bill’s passage also sets a foundation for
future marijuana legalization policy: one
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design to address criminal justice reform
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and racial inequality. There were
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about 663,000 marijuana-related arrests in the U.S.
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Friday’s vote reflects the shift in American
and global views on marijuana over the
past decade:
Polls show support for legalization has increased 20 percentage points, to 68 percent, since Colorado.
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The bill passed by a vote of 228-164, with
several Republicans on board. While the
MORE Act is not expected to come up in
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the Senate this year,
and likely won’t in the next session of Congress either, its passage nevertheless marks a monumental step in
marijuana policy.
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One in three people who have the virus have
no symptoms, so you could be spreading it
without knowing it,”buy marijuana with bitcoins
notes information from the U.K. government,
which has also issued video messages
emphasizing the need to stay home.
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