• “According to Richards, the IRS now considers unlicensed companies that work with plant-touching businesses as subject to 280E if they profited from marijuana sales – including the likes of management companies, landlords, leasing firms, etc., but clarity does not exist yet.”
• The other issue, he says, is the IRS is ramping up enforcement of the anti-laundering Bank Secrecy Act which requires the filing of Form 8300 with all cash payments over $10,000. If it plays hardball, the IRS could go back years into a company’s past and levy a fine of $25,000 per missing form.
• Richards anticipates the number of these audits expanding, especially in Colorado and California, in coming years.
• The IRS declined to comment on Richards’ guidance.

• The Hound, which consists of a briefcase usit and a handhelp device, will retail for about $5,000. It is about a billion times more sensitive than an alcohol breathalzer.
• Each test requires a $20 one-time use cartridge.
• The company believes the market for a THC breathalyzer could be worth $10B annually. This, along with financial backing from the insurance industry, suggests Hound Labs’ interests are less than perfect alignment with the cannabs industry.

• The idea of using psychedelics to treat depression, PTSD and other afflictions is gaining currency in serious medical circles. No doubt it still sounds wacky to some people, but then again, MED sounded a lot wackier to a lot more people a few years ago before Dr. Sanjay Gupta’s Weed documentaries on CNN.

• It bought Zepyr an AI platform used to discover and profile customers in a cash and stock deal worth more than $10M.
• Zefyr helps cannabis companies answer questions like where ideal customers are located and the products they prefer.
• New Frontier also bought lifestyle content company Civilized for an undisclosed sum.

Quick Hit

1. The Telegraph finds eight must-have apps for cannabis entrepreneurs.

• MedMen’s stock is trading around $1.58 per share. Last October it reached $9.
• MedMen is walking away with one of PharmaCann’s two Illinois grows, a shop and a retail license.

• New Cannabis Ventures weighs in on the tumult.

Quick Hit

1. ????WeedWeek Canada also has a great round-up of REC legalization’s not so happy first birthday up north.
2. Leafly suffered a data breach. It didn’t say how many users’ data was affected.
   Security Affairs

• While investigators remain unsure about the cause the primary focus is on illicit market THC vapes and vitamin.
• A new theory of the illness, associated with Colorado Green Lab is it’s caused by cadmum, a chemical found in the silver solder used to hold many cheap pens together. Cadmium is associated with a disease called Metal Fume Fever, which mainly affects welders, but which seems to have symptoms correlated to vape patients.
  Willamette Week
• “Ultimately, there’s very little known about what actually happens to the chemicals in e-cigarettes when you heat and inhale them,” the Rolling Stone story says.

• The industry was happy to welcome him. The key issue right now is banking: After the House passed the SAFE Banking Act last month. Should the bill pass the Senate banking committee, chaired by Idaho’s Mike Crapo (R), it will need McConnell’s support to pass the Senate.
  Politico
• What the solid Politico article doesn’t quite get, and McConnell almost certainly does, is that the cannabis industry and the GOP are natural allies.
• In light of the vape crisis, former FDA chair Dr. Scott Gottlieb essentially called for descheduling cannabis in a Wall Street Journal op-ed.
• There’s also still a lot of legalization opponents in the Republican base tweeted conservative pundit Laura Ingrahm. She warned industry money would support Democrats. Perhaps, she’ll reassess when she realizes it could help Republicans.
• NORML rates Crapo a D, but he has expressed support for some kind of banking bill.
• McConnell has not expressed support for such a bill, but the banking issue also affects his hemp farmers, which may make him more sympathetic.

• McConnell mostly listened. He called marijuana a “complicated issue” and while he didn’t make any commitments, he seemed to grasp the industry’s frustration around banking.

• “We put our best face forward,” a meeting attendee said. “We were strategic by not forcing him into a corner” by pressing him.
• This section was a little more political than WeedWeek usually gets. But as I’ve said here, here, here and here, the industry is at its least attractive when it’s kissing Republicans’ asses.

• As mayor of New York City, Giuliani was known for his dislike of ferrets. (It was a simpler time.)

• In response, “outraged” Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak (D) immediately announced the creation of a multi-agency task force to “root out potential corruption or criminal influences in Nevada’s marijuana marketplace.”
• Leafly fills in the details on the cannabis side.