The cannabis business is really a job creator: Trulieve CEO
Kim Rivers, Trulieve CEO joins the Yahoo Finance panel to discuss The MORE Act which is scheduled for a full floor vote this week.
Video Transcript
ZACK GUZMAN: I mean, your company just like the whole sector overall, has caught a boost here over the last month. Shares up 167% year to date. But when we talk about how big this vote is though, what does it signal to you about how far the conversation around legalization has come in just, I guess even just a matter of months here, where we sit now?
KIM RIVERS: You know, Zack, first of all, thanks so much for having me. It really is a watershed moment. We've had quite a few of those recently in the cannabis industry. And the first being the fact that the conversation is even happening at all between presidential candidates. And then now that Vice President-elect Harris has taken it one step further to actually show action, is very encouraging for the space and for the sector.
We are excited about the future. I agree there is an uphill battle in the Senate with respect to ultimate passage. But look, I think that this past election sent a very clear message across many markets in many states in that every single state that had any type of marijuana act on the ballot passed overwhelmingly. Whether those states were red states or blue states, in the South or in the Northeast, they all passed.
And so I think that the signal that the legislators are hearing is that this is a human issue. It's no longer a partisan one, it's a human one. And so we expect our leadership to respond to that very strong message and strong signal. Now of course, the devil's in the details, and we'll start to talk about what that means. But to even have the conversation around the actual policy is in of itself, just a huge step. So we're very excited about it.
ZACK GUZMAN: You mention the states that had that up to voters in this election cycle. All five sweeping in terms of those cannabis measures. It seems interesting, because investors might look at that and say, look, maybe the conversation in terms of legalization at a federal level might not matter as much if states continue to move this rapidly and you have so many people now able to purchase cannabis in some of these states. But talk to me about why investors might be overlooking some of the key aspects of legalizing at a federal level when it comes to taxes and accessing banking as well. How does that change things for you at Truelieve?
KIM RIVERS: Sure, absolutely. So as a legal cannabis business operating in the United States, we are operating at a significant disadvantage to any other normal business in the following ways. Number one, we can't be listed on the New York Stock Exchange or on NASDAQ because of the nature of it being a federally illegal business. So while we are public, we're listed in Canada on a CSE.
However, the Canadian companies can actually be listed on the US exchanges. So those tickers that you just flashed on the screen, those were all actual Canadian businesses that have no US operations. And so that in and of itself, of course, is huge from an investor's perspective. Secondly, we're taxed at an extreme tax rate. So it's under 280e, which basically means we're taxed as an illegal business. And so effectively, we're taxed at approximately 50%. We have no access to business loans or even accelerated depreciation, other ways to grow our business, again, in a normal environment.
And then finally, as you mentioned, access to banking. And so because again, that federal illegality, many banks aren't able to do business with us, because of federal banking laws. And so we do have banking relationships, but with state chartered banks. And so again, we don't have access to all of those normalized business lending tools. And we're very, it's very important for us to have some movement on the federal level, so that we can just operate like any other normalized business in the US.
And really, the cannabis business is a job creator. At Truelieve alone, we employ over 4,000 individuals. I've got 200 outstanding positions now. I'm hiring during a pandemic, and we want to be economic contributors to this country. But unfortunately, there are a lot of roadblocks to that, again, that are at the federal level.
And so and then finally I would just mention that access to those small business loans are so important to actually providing true opportunity for those disadvantaged communities that want to enter this industry. So while we have seen, of course, a lot of conversation around access to licenses for minority and for minorities, I think that that's only the first step. The second step is making sure that those businesses are set up for success, which again, we have a framework to do that in this country. However, that's currently not available to those businesses. So excited to see that conversation progressing too.
AKIKO FUJITA: Kim, that's a pretty long list of hurdles that you've just laid out there. How much growth from a business standpoint can actually be unlocked if those roadblocks, as you've called them, are removed? Do you have a number that you can point to?
KIM RIVERS: Oh, geez. You know, I would say that it's, it's infinitely larger than the current, than the current business landscape. When we look at and when we think about just the sheer adoption rates that we're seeing currently in states, when you think about just medical programs. I mean, medical programs, for example, in the state of Florida, we've got about a 2% adoption rate. We believe that'll be up to 4%.
When we talk about adult use, and really what that means, is that folks are able to just access cannabis like they would any other regulated product. So when we think about it similar to alcohol, as an example, I think the numbers are very similar there. So you definitely plus up a market to approximately, let's call it 10%, of the population.
And so it's a very large opportunity that currently, again, a lot of folks don't have access to. And then again as a business, our ability to take those dollars that we're currently using to pay taxes on, reinvest that into our business, creating opportunities for additional employment, how that cycles into secondary effects back into the economy, really, it's quite the economic impact study.
