POWER PLAYERS: ELIZABETH MORRIS ON CANNABIZ LENDING
Who couldn’t use some extra cash these days?
For the Power Players interview, I spoke to Elizabeth Morris, COO of Dynamic Alternative Finance which has facilitated about $100M in loans to cannabis businesses. It sounds like the company is very busy.
A few highlights:
On the perils of cannabis companies borrowing money:
One thing that we do see, unfortunately, is someone will call us and say they thought they had a deal. It was a really good fit. They had a great term sheet and wonderful rates and the lender charged them $25,000 on the front end to do underwriting and then decided not to do that deal.
On the state of lending:
In equipment finance and real estate, people are still lending, but it’s taking a little bit longer. The underwriting is a little bit more strenuous because the investors have seen wild fluctuations in the market and in their own liquidity.
On being “recession proof”:
I don’t think cannabis is as recession proof as some people initially thought it was going to be. The basis for me saying that is it’s become clear that in certain states, like Colorado and Nevada, that the industry has a high dependency on tourism. It’s not well known that 25% of cannabis revenue in Colorado is from out of state visitors.
And check out some of our recent Power Players interviews:
- LeafLink CEO Ryan G. Smith
- Ello Capital Managing Partner Hershel Gerson
- T3 Ventures’ Tahira Rehmatullah
Got any thoughts on who the next Power Player should be? Email us at hello@weedweek.net
