On the morning of May 29, the Los Angeles-based cannabis company MedMen got its listing on the Canadian Securities Exchange. With a chain of 12 posh cannabis storefronts in California and New York, as well as a sprawling greenhouse facility in Nevada, MedMen is going public through a \u201creverse merger\u201d with Vancouver-based Ladera Ventures Corp.<\/p>\n
A \u201creverse merger,\u201d otherwise known as a \u201creverse takeover (RTO)<\/a>,\u201d allows a private company to go public by taking over a publicly traded \u201cshell company.\u201d And MedMen isn\u2019t the first American company to use the reverse takeover strategy to get a public listing \u2014 they\u2019re only the latest company in a growing trend.<\/p>\n MedMen<\/a>\u00a0seems to represent the cannabis industry\u2019s fast-growing mainstream acceptance. The company\u00a0bills itself<\/a>\u00a0as strictly high-end. It has outlets on Los Angeles\u2019 Santa Monica Boulevard and just off New York\u2019s Fifth Ave, which are two prestige locations in the United States. However, because MedMen sells products containing cannabinoids that are technically illegal at the federal level, American stock exchanges are closed even to such stylish enterprises as this one. Listing on the Canadian exchanges is the next best alternative for selling shares and raising capital for expansion.<\/p>\n A\u00a0Bloomberg profile<\/a>\u00a0says that Ladera Ventures \u201cdoes not have significant operations,\u201d but \u201cis seeking new business opportunities to either acquire or participate.\u201d Previously, Ladera Ventures was involved in oil and natural gas operations in Alberta.<\/p>\n In its public statements, MedMen is portraying the reverse takeover strategy as an interim measure before access to U.S. stock markets is won. \u201cYou\u2019re going to see more and more cannabis companies listing on the major stock exchanges in the U.S.,\u201d MedMen spokesperson Daniel Yi\u00a0told Forbes\u00a0upon news<\/a> of the reverse takeover.<\/p>\n Yi\u00a0predicted that the New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ will soon open their doors to companies like MedMen. Then, he said, \u201cyou\u2019re going to see some migration\u201d from Canada to the U.S. \u201cThat\u2019s the beauty of having free markets and open borders.\u201d<\/p>\n With more states liberalizing their cannabis laws, Yi rhetorically asked at what point federal prohibition will \u201cbecome a moot point.\u201d He added optimistically: \u201cFrom a capital standpoint, there\u2019s a tipping point, and I think we\u2019re very close to that tipping point.\u201d<\/p>\n And indeed, there are some signs of hope. While it might seem paradoxical, a few Canadian companies have been granted listings on U.S. stock markets. Also this week, Ontario-based Canopy Growth\u00a0became the first<\/a>\u00a0\u201cplant-touching\u201d cannabis company to list on the New York Stock Exchange. Back in February, Cronos Group of Toronto\u00a0became the first<\/a>\u00a0Canadian cannabis company to list on NASDAQ. But no U.S.-based cannabis enterprise yet lists on either the NYSE or NASDAQ.<\/p>\n It is Toronto that has emerged as the financial center of the cannabis industry. Home of the Toronto Stock Exchange (which hosts\u00a0Canopy Growth<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Aphira Inc<\/a>, two of Canada\u2019s cannabis giants) and Canadian Securities Exchange, the city has traditionally served as the financial hub of the mining industry. And this proximity has apparently resulted in an unlikely synergy of the cannabis and mining industries.<\/p>\n As\u00a0New Cannabis Ventures<\/a>\u00a0website notes, Toronto-based\u00a0cannabis company\u00a0Supreme Pharmaceuticals<\/a>\u00a0now holds gold claims in British Columbia. And\u00a0Aurora Cannabis<\/a>\u00a0of Vancouver went public in 2014 after it executed a reverse takeover with\u00a0Prescient Mining Corporation<\/a>, a Vancouver-based firm with uranium operations in Saskatchewan.<\/p>\n Canada certainly\u00a0far surpasses<\/a>\u00a0the U.S. in legal cannabis production, and despite the recent cracks in Wall Street\u2019s prohibitionist edifice, Uncle Sam is also being left behind by his northern neighbor in the industry\u2019s financial sphere. It remains to be seen if state-by-state liberalization will provide a sufficient critical mass to pry open the stock exchanges of New York City \u2014even in the face of ongoing federal prohibition.<\/p>\n TELL US<\/strong>,\u00a0did you know about cannabis companies using reverse takeovers?<\/p>\n The post Reverse Takeovers: How U.S. Cannabis Companies Get Listed on the Canadian Stock Exchange<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
On the morning of May 29, the Los Angeles-based cannabis company MedMen got its listing on the Canadian Securities Exchange. With a chain of 12 posh cannabis storefronts in California and New York, as well as a sprawling greenhouse facility in Nevada, MedMen is going public through a \u201creverse merger\u201dContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":190,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4441,630,4319,148,34,50,461,170,2183,879,4231,4442,37],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26550"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/190"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26550"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26550\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26551,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26550\/revisions\/26551"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26550"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26550"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26550"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Canadian Vs. American Stock Markets<\/h4>\n
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\nRead More: Reverse Takeovers: How U.S. Cannabis Companies Get Listed on the Canadian Stock Exchange<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"