harley
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
The established marijuana selling states are raking in hundreds of millions of dollars in all cash tax revenue. Imagine the numbers when credit cards can be used. The shift away from the "black market" has happened already in these states and there is no reason to think it won't happen in every state that legalizes.
Not quite true. In all the states with recreational pot legal the black market is still thriving. The taxes and regulation drive the legal price up to close to double the street price. California's new market has an eighth going for $50-$65, and the black market price is still around $20.
I have a small stake in IIPR which is a medical marijuana REIT. It got hammered along with all the other stocks, even though their business model has nothing to do with legalization/recreational use.
Actually Sessions' announcement doesn't really effect the legal market. The Cole memo only addressed medical marijuana, so revoking it also only effects medical. But in reality, the announcement doesn't really change anything, since federal prosecutions are only about 1% of the total drug arrests. And, at least for now, the Rohrabacher-Farr amendment still prevents the feds from spending any money to prosecute medical marijuana (recreational is still not addressed in all this).
As interested as I am in the topic, I'm still not seeing a big opportunity investment wise. I'll just keep on indexing and dreaming of the day one of my states lets me walk into a store and buy some legal pot.