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Episode Summary:
Afghanistan Growing Weed To get The Taliban Rich?
70% Cannabis Consumers say they will use Cannabis instead of alcohol this holiday season.
- AFC Gamma (NASDAQ:AFCG)
- Auxly Cannabis Group(OTCQX: CBWTF)
- Cresco Labs(OTCQX:CRLBF)
- Ascend Wellness Holdings (OTCQX:AAWH)
- MedMen Enterprises (OTCQX: MMNFF)
- TILT Holdings (OTCQX:TLLTF)
Hosted & Produced By:
Elliot Lane
Aaron Thomas
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Unedited Transcript:
My friends, what is up? It is Friday, December 17th. Feel good Friday. This is Elliot lane helping you out with cannabis daily on some cannabis news stock insights moving into the weekend.
One last day of trading before a few days off. Thanks as always to produce our Aaron Thomas will join us in a few minutes to chat through some cultural topics in the industry. And as always, thanks to Benzinga for giving us the platform super excited to be here with you today. Let's dive right in.
There's some interesting and fun pieces of news to cover. So advanced fire. As well as your, a destined advanced flower capital is listed on the NASDAQ, a F C G V. Destined is private, but made up of industry leading investors and just, oh, geez. Love that blender that they're both REITs and the space provide $150 million credit facility to acreage.
Yes, this will be to help streamline capital structure and execute refocused business plan. A hundred million is available for immediate use a hundred million available for me to use. So that's incredible to me. AFCG and Varidesk, and obviously throwing their hat in the ring with acreage who is of course.
Forever and still has an open deal with canopy growth. So keep that in mind as well. Love this bit of news for three pretty amazing companies and strong companies in the industry. Obviously cannabis, CB WTF. They are a Canadian licensed producer, AKA. They touch the plant and grow it in Canada.
Received four awards for its CPG brands at the second annual kind awards tied for the most of. These awards are published in kind magazine and recognize the best Canadian cannabis as determined by a panel of nearly 250 bud tenders across Canada. That's pretty telling to me, I don't really mention a lot of product and strains and things like that.
But when it comes to people who know the quality of cannabis choosing. What is the best cannabis and it happens to be in an investible company. I want to bring that information to you. So Oxley, cannabis, CBD WTF, they have had a good last, I would say three plus months as an LP there aren't many of them, but I think they're one of them.
Cresco labs, CRL, BF offers new classes to help people who want to get into the. Opening the Illinois cannabis education center. Pretty cool. They're a sin wellness aawh receives conditional approval from the New York cannabis control board for previously announced a definitive investment agreement with med men, M in F find the details of that investment agreement on benzinga.com/cannabis.
This might be my favorite news of the day here. So I, I do want to set that up a little. The widely denied media reports on a German company being in talks with Afghanistan, for cannabis cultivation, turn out to be true. It's true. It's all true. The new regime looking to establish legal cannabis production for the export market C farm is the German company.
It will invest $450 million. And setting up a hashish processing company in and for Afghanistan, cultivation, Afghanistan, of course. When you think of the conservative nature of the Taliban, you think of they do not like drugs. They don't like cannabis. They have inflicted a lot of punishment on people who have grown and sold cannabis in the past, but they utilized it during the occupation of the U S forces and allied forces.
And during that time they saw the benefit. It can have economically, so they are actively pursuing it as a major way for, to bring in revenue to the country and to the regime. However, I do expect that this will reach some international headwinds. 'cause I can't imagine people are gonna want the Taliban to get rich.
I'm interested in following this news down the line and I can't wait to get errands thoughts on that too. Verano VRN O F opens 41st dispensary in Florida unity road. Here's another cool one. I and L B for item 900. Unity road. Is there franchising and like McDonald's is a McDonald's franchise.
Unity road is item nine labs, dispensary, franchise NGS, first agreement in South Dakota. They're now developing franchises in nine states. So that's big news. I think they are really the only company that is actively pursuing this. A franchising, a cannabis dispensary chain and unity road is that trade, as I said so props to Jeffrey and Andrew, the whole team over there at I N L.
Tilt holdings. Commonwealth alternative care is to be the first recreational dispensary in Taunton, Massachusetts. I always like mentioning T L T F when I get the chance because I love Gary Santo. I think he has a really stayed ahead of the market when it comes to the past. We'll say 11 to 12 months.
That's it for the stock news today. A lot of fun news for AFCG. For acreage for CB WTF and Oxley Cresco labs, making moves to help the industry CIN wellness and med men received conditional approval as well as Verano and you need to road and item nine labs and tilt all making waves on this fine Friday.
So that's it for the stock side. Aaron Thomas, come over, come in hot man. And tell me what you think about Afghanistan growing. What's up. Everybody has a go in happy Fridays, zinger, nation Afghanistan grown weed. Let's see, I hope they got enough water. It seems like it's a very dry area, right?
This could be look at the stocks for G RWG AgriFood. And once folks is available to invest in I maybe we'll get some definitive agreements go on for those three companies. Probably bring it back to stocks for you guys here. And drop us with some knowledge bonds, man, what you got? Yes. So the holiday season is right around the corner and a very Merry Christmas ahead as 70% of cannabis consumers plan to use more weed during the holiday season.
The holiday season is a joyful time for many people. However, it can bring some unwelcome guests such as stress and depression, which often kick off a vicious cycle where stress is compensated by overeating and drinking resulting in weight gain and another inevitable round of stress. That's why roughly 70% of cannabis users say they plan on consuming more weed and less booze over the holidays reported by a CBD Oracle, a cannabis consumer research company, and a new.
As the December holidays have traditionally been linked to increased drinking, it looks like cannabis is set to take over this Christmas. What do you think? I think. I have a lot of respect for those that would like to replace drinking with cannabis. Obviously cannabis is a much safer form of consumption regarding the body and physically of course don't drive and smoke.
But in terms of what I'll be doing, to be honest I'm not gonna give up my bourbon. I'm a Kentucky, we drink bourbon. But I. Consumption can increase for both alcohol users and people who'd like to replace alcohol. So I think in terms of the messaging there I think alcohol users probably those that spoke cannabis and drink alcohol should also be an active part of this survey.
But past that I'm not surprised everybody needs to chill out 2021. Following up 2020, it's been a long two years. Y'all you deserve to know. Exactly. And I honestly, I like this move, alcohol is people go crazy during the holidays and accidents and. Just like the most unfortunate situations are on the rise.
And being able to have your wits about you at the end of the night, because cannabis doesn't make you completely impaired you can take it, you can take however much you need. And however much you feel will make you feel comfortable, but you definitely don't need.
You don't ever consume enough to where you're making bad decisions or you're not able to operate heavy machinery, that kind of thing. So I definitely liked the consuming, tested good weed. The only issues I've ever heard of are those who are. And that, and I'm sorry for those people. Oh, Erin man, you and me?
You're on the same page there, my friend, but what else what'd you got for us? Let's move along. So some big names, queen Latifa novice, Troy Carter, invest in cannabis store, taking owners from poverty to $450,000 in sales. So at the dispensary concept 64 and hope will open its second of 21 locations owned by social equity, cannabis licensees from south LA on December 20th.
The wellness focus culture, rich cannabis store is named after proposition 64, which legalized cannabis in California and the hope for a more equitable. Why this matters. The ethos opened the door to diverse and exclusive collaborations that strive for authenticity inclusion, including Angela rye, queen Latifa talking terms, clever Lang it's purple and newly launched R N B w so explicitly.
They explicitly developed to produce economic parody for people harmed by the war on drugs. Each business is projected to increase licensees income from 46,000. $46,000 under the poverty line in LA to $450,000 annually and create 30 to $40 or 30 to 40 jobs with benefits. That's incredible.
That should be getting a lot more coverage. Cause this is the second time I'm hearing about it. But the first was in conversation with you for this podcast. A lot of focus has been on the legislative side. And on politicians looking for a win for a headline keeping safe, banking out not expunging, nonviolent cannabis, criminal records, like they should.
But meanwhile, you have people like queen Latifa knots, and I'm sorry, there's one other there, but those three are actively changing people's lives. That's fantastic. All the props to them in the world and let's make sure we cover news like that more often. Absolutely. Anything that's focused on social equity and social justice, I'm all for we have a lot of celebrities hopping on this wagon right now, such as we have the Sarah Silverman and Seth Rogan and their initiative to get the.
Was it the Senate to agree on the bill, on the reform. So definitely a lot of movement from a lot of big names. Yeah. And not a lot of people like celebrities getting involved with politics, but one thing they can do is advocate for the betterment of of society in ways like this, and also actively participate.
So when they actively participate, their word means. So that is something to consider as well. But anyway, great storyline here. And thanks for bringing that out. Of course. And let's let's end it with a bit of political news a little bit. So the DEA backs, white house plan to streamline research on marijuana, psychedelics and other scheduled.
Drugs. So the DEA and national Institute on drug abuse say they are in favor of white house proposal to streamline the process of researching schedule one drugs like marijuana and certain psychedelics. The agencies testified at a house energy and commerce subcommittee hearing on Thursday expressing support for the office of national drug control policy research plant The focus of the meeting was mostly on a controversial move to strictly classify fentanyl related substances.
The Biden administration's proposal research components would also help address concerns within the scientific community about the difficulty of studying other schedule on drugs. It is critical fro a few quotes from that meeting. It is critical that the scientific and medical community schedule or study schedule one substances as some may turn out to have therapeutic value.
It is absolutely baffling to me that these drugs are not already studied on an active basis. Like all the time. All the time, like where apple funding. How on earth are you going to solve a crisis that's been happening for decades in overdosing, in addiction? If you aren't studying the cause that's insanity to me and saying that honestly, like when you look at that the executive branch.
Currently and their their mood towards schedule one drugs given his son and his son's addiction. I am not surprised that Biden's administration is making this move. I also is not surprising to me that Joe Biden is not quick to move on cannabis and because of that as well, but I am surprised that he's not moving faster on expunging Rex.
But that aside this is it's shocking to me that this wasn't already happening, but I'm very glad it's starting to happen. Absolutely. So anyway, not to be melodramatic there, but I was a little bit surprised. No. The DEA said themselves in written testimony that expanding access to schedule and research as a critical part of the DA's mission to protect public safety and health.
Like you said if we have all these overdoses, we have all these instances of bad experiences with drugs. Why aren't we doing the research beforehand? Why haven't we been doing that research beforehand? We've had all this where we could have had all this knowledge up until this point and prevented all this right.
Good storyline. My friend, honestly it's something to consider. There's still a lot of work to do on multiple fronts when it comes to moving us forward in the cannabis industry, moving us forward in as a country. But. I'm glad for starting something now is all I can say. That's Friday, honestly, a lot of great news in the cannabis space this week, a lot of companies making moves stocks may be underperforming.
They may be hit, but keep in mind. A lot of that is not the fault of the companies. It is. Do your research, do your due diligence. There are a lot of fantastic companies in this industry in a lot of companies that you just keep on your watch list, but outside of that, y'all come to benzinga.com/cannabis.
Get your information daily, let us know rate and review us on the podcast link that you listened to us on apple, Spotify, let us know what you think and what you want to hear. And we will do our best to make this podcast for you. BZ cannabis.com, VZ cannabis.com. Come meet me and Aaron Thomas in person next April at our first cannabis capital conference of 2022.
You'll have all your major industry leaders there. We look forward to seeing you on four 20 and 4 21. That's right. 4 24, 21 in Miami, Florida looking forward to it then, but until then, Aaron, all of you out there have a fantastic week and we'll see you again. Take care of guys.
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