HOW MEDMEN COLLAPSED
Politico goes long on the “cautionary tale” of MedMen‘s precipitous fall from “Apple of pot” to “WeWork of weed:”
“[It all began to unravel [in 2018.] The company got hit with a class-action lawsuit from employees alleging labor law violations. Miffed investors sued the founders, accusing them of self-dealing and other underhanded tactics. A former chief financial officer filed a blockbuster complaint in a Los Angeles court accusing the founders of a slew of misdeeds, from manipulating MedMen’s stock price, to bank fraud, to seeking private intelligence groups to get dirt on their enemies, to calling an L.A. city councilman a “midget negro” and making an illegal straw man contribution to a Nevada politician.”
The story notes:
“The company’s fall reverberates far beyond its stakeholders, because its glitzy rise was propelled by the promise of an entire industry. Its woes reflect the precarious status of the cannabis business: legalized by states but still criminalized by the federal government, its position makes traditional bank financing impossible and puts companies at the mercy of a patchwork of regulators.”
- MedMen declined to comment for the story.
In other MSO news:
- In earnings, Curaleaf missed expectations on revenue but beat on EBITDA.
Market Realist - Trulieve beat estimates and said the pandemic isn’t hurting business.
MarketWatch - Green Growth Brands is heading into the Canadian equivalent of bankruptcy.
Green Market Report - Acreage said it would sell some “non-core assets.”
Pot stocks jumped last week. New Cannabis Ventures analyzes why.
PLUS: Bloomberg suggests the pandemic’s economic fallout means big things for the cannabis industry.
