Cannabis, it was bound to be big
Four years ago I wrote a post that I was interested in the cannabis space. My inbox starting to hum. As far as I was concerned, there was no doubt that the cannabis industry was going to be a huge legal business where investors could partake, taxes would be paid and jobs would be created. Once the cat slips out of the bag, it generally never goes back in.
I woke up to a text this morning from my friend who sent me an article from Business Insider with the headline, Congress just quietly passed a law that could spark a boom for the $1 billion marijuana-linked CBD industry. It is game-changing.
It has not been easy for the early to the party companies (even in California) to navigate the laws. It continues to get easier but this could be a watershed moment. Weed is good for people. Read this article in the NYTimes about Olders Americans Flocking to Medical Marijuana (soon no need for the word medical). As an investor and true believer in Octavia Wellness, I have a front seat to the impact and relief seniors are getting from their products.
I’d like to see states take all the taxes that will be generated by Cannabis and direct it only to education and transportation. Those are two areas that are in massive need of capital and both of them make a huge difference on the economy. I would also hope that that more institutional investors get in the game of investing in these Cannabis companies because what is happening now is that the majority of the capital is coming from Canada who is taking advantage of many due to lack of capital. There are many who are tremendously overvalued as well. I am hoping that this law will be a change in the right direction on many levels.
Comments (Archived):
There is a tremendous opportunity here: to generate funding to meet some of our countries greatest needs, to combat many of the negative externalities of current chronic pain management protocols, and to build an entirely new value chain from a digitally-native perspective. I think it’s fascinating. Full of both risk and opportunity. I have heard there will be something like 6-7 cannabis companies in this winter’s YC class (incl. a company I have invested in/advise), a sign of both recognition of the magnitude of opportunity and a changing early stage landscape.
for sure.
Is it now also legal to import cannabis to the US under this new legal framework, or is it home grown supply only?
Not sure
To my knowledge everything Cannabis now is state by state laws and there is no economic advantage for them not to insist that it is grown in state to drive both wages and investment and taxes. It is a really huge money game.
yes, follow the money.
Hi–I’m a big believer in the space.Wanted to make a clarification that the headline of the BI article misleads the facts to my understanding.CBD can be derived from Hemp or Cannabis, completely different strains.CBD from Hemp is legal and during the extraction derives minimal, legal, amounts of THC. Because of the legal classification which this law changes has been mostly unbanked as the gateways will not allow transactions forcing entrepreneurs to be kicked off of Amazon, forced to cash businesses or use offshore transaction gateways up north of 18%.CBD from Cannabis is a different animal and as well the balance of CBD and THC is imo where the hypercharged value of the ingredients comes into play. That is not impacted by this law to my knowledge and right now Cannabis extracted CBD can only be sold in Cannabis legal jurisdictions.But it is a really big deal.And btw some of the more interesting entrepreneurial activities within the CBD world are cosmetics, body products driven by a large number of women entrepreneurs.Sorry for the lecture!An aside: Wrote this a bit back about the unbanked piece of it– Crypto, CBD, Cannabis and the broader markets http://arnoldwaldstein.com/…