Illinois will likely become the 11th state in the US to allow small amounts of marijuana for recreational use. The state’s Democrat-controlled House sent a legalisation plan to governor JB Pristzker, also a Democrat. Pritzker was elected in 2018; he campaigned as a support of legalization. “This will have a transformational impact on our state, creating opportunity in the communities that need it most and giving so many a second chance,” Mr Pritzker said. The rule would make it legal for those 21 and older to buy marijuana at licensed dispensaries. Residents could possess up to 1 ounce (30 grams) and non-residents could have 15 grams. (See also: In landmark move, Illinois lawmakers approve adult-use cannabis program that could hit $2 billion in sales | Marijuana advocates hit unexpected roadblocks)

Excoriated by some policymakers and by the legal cannabis industry as an unfair competitor and as a demonstration that legalization isn’t working, the illicit market remains popular with consumers for reasons of price, quality, and product availability. According to a survey conducted by Vikiana Clement, the executive director of the Cannabis Education Task Force at Brooklyn’s Medgar Evers College, so-called “illicit” cannabis operators actually performed better than their corporate competition on several key metrics, including the “triple-bottom line” of social and environmental responsibility as well as pure profit.

Con el primer día de 2020, comenzó la venta legal de mariguana para uso recreativo en Illinois y muchas personas se formaron desde muy temprano en los dispensarios. Illinois ya permitía la mariguana para uso médico, pero desde ahora el undécimo estado en permitir su consumo y venta para fines recreativos. La ley aprobada por el Congreso estatal, de mayoría demócrata, y después por el gobernador demócrata J.B. Pritzker, permite a las personas de 21 años o más poseer hasta 30 gramos de cannabis en forma de planta y hasta 5 gramos de la sustancia concentrada de la planta. (Véase también: Marihuana con fines recreativos, legal en Illinois)

California’s marijuana market, which reached an estimated $4.4 billion in sales in 2020, has seemingly reached peak cannabis capitalism. But the overwhelming sense amongst the so-called “legacy growers” is that they’re at a breaking point, exhausted by the regulations of the industry that they largely created. Protecting existing growers was a pillar of Proposition 64, which legalized marijuana for adult use. Legalization advocates included a provision to encourage legacy growers to join the legal market, promising that no cultivation site would be larger than one acre until 2023, so that small farms wouldn’t face competition from multi-acre ‘mega farms’ for at least five years. But cannabis industry lobbyists persuaded the California Department of Food and Agriculture to change the provision.

Roland Conner never imagined that getting arrested for marijuana in the ‘90s would lead to where he is now: the owner of a new cannabis dispensary in the heart of Greenwich Village. The blocks surrounding his shop, Smacked Village, are bustling with potential customers among the NYU students and people coming in for the city’s nightlife — and New York took extraordinary steps to make it work. By far the biggest perk is that a state agency located, leased and will renovate a storefront on one of the priciest slabs of real estate in the world to help someone sell a drug that once landed people in prison. But Conner’s fledgling cannabis business is also vastly outnumbered by illicit competitors that have sprouted all over the city since the state legalized weed for adults nearly two years ago.

With Canada the largest nation to completely legalize marijuana, the world’s most valuable pot company, Canopy Growth Corp., founded in 2013 and now worth about $6.4 billion, is one of the most controversial pot companies, the embodiment of Big Marijuana that critics contend uses size, market power, and lobbying prowess to accelerate the loosening of cannabis laws around the world and shoulder out competitors and smaller businesses. Already Big Alcohol, Big Tobacco, and Big Pharma have bought their way into Canopy and other marijuana companies. And, like those longstanding giants, the new cannabis corporations are spending millions of dollars lobbying for laws that let them sell large volumes of potentially addictive products.

The House of Representatives passed the MORE Act on Friday by a vote of 228-164. It was 2018, Democrats were about to gain control of the House of Representatives, and cannabis justice advocates knew they needed to get to work. Every two years, a handful of new states were joining those that had already legalized cannabis, either recreationally or medicinally. Federal decriminalization was inevitable. If advocates wanted to have any say in what legislation would look like, the first Democratic House majority since 2011 was their best chance to make inroads. Every cannabis measure up for a vote last month passed convincingly. One in three Americans now live in states that have legalized recreational use.

If the federal government legalizes cannabis, lawmakers should beware of monopolization by national corporations, says Shaleen Title, chief executive of the cannabis policy think tank Parabola Center. Title authored a paper on preventing monopolies in the marijuana market, outlining how domination by big business is a threat to the existing cannabis industry. She writes that “the recent wave of market consolidation and high barriers to entry for smaller actors foreshadow a future national market controlled by only a handful of companies.” Title cautions that tobacco and alcohol companies are quietly laying the groundwork with the hope of controlling the legal cannabis market.

GOP presidential candidate Gary Johnson drew headlines earlier this month when he said he would issue a full presidential pardon for anyone serving a prison sentence for marijuana. He elaborated on that promise adding that it's only a matter of time before marijuana is legalized. "Clearly it is when, not if," he said of legalizing cannabis. "When 50 percent of the population says to the other 50 percent, 'You belong behind bars for your actions,' that's not good law, that is just not good law at all."

The Jamaica Stock Exchange (JSE) has joined other stock markets across the globe in bracing for the impact of the Cannabis Banking Bill, which is currently before the US Congress. Having already been passed by the US House of Representatives on September 25, the SAFE Banking Act, which now goes to the Senate, where if it is passed would lift restrictions in the US on American banks doing business with cannabis companies. As a result of this move, securities exchanges in Jamaica and around the world are considering the implications for their own economic institutions. At present, foreign-based financial institutions with US banking relationships cannot freely work with legal cannabis businesses.

A judge has ruled that a Philadelphia nonprofit group's plan to open the first supervised injection site in the U.S. where people can use illegal opioids under medical supervision does not violate federal drug laws, delivering a major setback to Justice Department lawyers who launched a legal challenge to block the facility. U.S. District Judge Gerald McHugh ruled that Safehouse's plan to allow people to bring in their own drugs and use them in a medical facility to help combat fatal overdoses does not violate the Controlled Substances Act. "The ultimate goal of Safehouse's proposed operation is to reduce drug use, not facilitate it," McHugh wrote in his opinion. (See also: Huge court win for Philly safe consumption site⁠ — But fight isn’t over)

La Cámara Baja de EE.UU. aprobó un proyecto de ley para despenalizar la marihuana a nivel federal y traer justicia a las minorías afroamericana e hispana, encarceladas de forma desproporcionada por la posesión de esa sustancia. La iniciativa, que aún debe ser debatida en el Senado -donde no tiene muchas posibilidades de salir adelante-, recibió el voto a favor de 220 legisladores, mientras que 202 votaron en contra. El proyecto propone despenalizar en todo Estados Unidos el consumo de marihuana, cuyo uso recreativo es legal en 18 de los 50 estados del país mientras que otros 37 permiten el uso médico. También propone borrar los antecedentes penales de aquellos condenados por posesión y consumo de cannabis, siempre que sus crímenes no hubieran sido violentos.

El consumo de marihuana entre los jóvenes en Estados Unidos en general ha aumentado en los últimos años, pero un nuevo artículo sugiere que en los estados donde se ha legalizado la marihuana recreativa, el consumo de marihuana entre los jóvenes puede estar disminuyendo. Las leyes que legalizaron la marihuana recreativa se asociaron con una caída de 8% en el número de estudiantes de secundaria que dijeron que habían consumido marihuana en los últimos 30 días, y una caída de 9% en el número que dijeron que habían usado al menos 10 veces en los últimos 30 días, según el artículo publicado en la revista médica JAMA Pediatrics.

El Comité Judicial de la Cámara de Representantes de EE.UU. dio luz verde a un proyecto de ley que legalizaría la marihuana a nivel federal en el país, eliminándola de la lista de sustancias controladas, por lo que supera así un paso previo a la votación en el pleno de esa cámara. La legislación aprobada hoy (24-10) tiene una alta probabilidad de ser aprobada en la Cámara Baja, donde los demócratas tienen el control con 234 escaños, aunque se espera que enfrente una batalla más dura en el Senado, dominado por los republicanos, mayoritariamente contrarios a la legalización de la marihuana. (Véase también: EEUU da el primer paso para legalizar el cannabis en todo el país, el sector se dispara)

El productor canadiense de marihuana Canopy Growth y la firma de inversión estadounidense especializada en este producto Acreage Holdings han alcanzado un acuerdo que otorga al primero el derecho a adquirir el 100% de las acciones del segundo por un importe total de 3.400 millones de dólares (3.000 millones de euros). Según informan ambas compañías en un comunicado, el acuerdo está supeditado a que la producción y venta de cannabis sea legal en Estados Unidos, además de a la aprobación de sus accionistas y de la Corte Suprema de British Columbia, en Canadá. (Véase también: La canadiense Canopy Growth compra el productor de cannabis español Cafina)

Es un negocio que cada año mueve unos US$150.000 millones. Por ello, no sorprende que grandes compañías estén luchando por hacerse con una parte del mercado global de la marihuana ofreciendo productos tan diversos como cervezas o galletas para perros. Así lo señala un informe de la empresa calificadora de riesgos Standard & Poor's, que prevé una expansión del sector en la medida en la que crece el uso legal de la marihuana. El reporte advierte que ese crecimiento podría ser volátil debido a los cambios en el marco regulatorio, pero apunta hacia el crecimiento en sectores como la salud, las bebidas alcohólicas, las gaseosas o los productos de belleza.

Junto con las elecciones federales en Estados Unidos se someten a consideración numerosas iniciativas de muy diversos temas a nivel estatal. Uno de los más sobresalientes en esta elección fue el de la política de drogas. Esta vez, no sólo se votaron proyectos para crear regular de manera legal los mercados de cannabis, sino también otros relacionados con diversas sustancias, especialmente con psicodélicos y enteógenos. Todas las iniciativas ganaron: el prohibicionismo cayéndose precisamente en el lugar donde fue ideológica y políticamente creado. A partir de ahora, una de cada tres personas en Estados Unidos vive en un lugar con cannabis legal.

Los negocios de venta minorista de cannabis en el estado de Nueva York han generado unos 150 millones de dólares en su primer año tras el establecimiento de regulaciones para el sector. La Oficina de Gestión del Cannabis informó en un comunicado, con sus proyecciones previas al cierre del ejercicio, que se han vendido casi 4 millones de unidades de productos de cannabis, encabezadas por productos comestibles, flores y cigarrillos ya liados. La autoridad indicó que espera una recaudación fiscal de unos 16,3 millones de dólares en el ejercicio. Uno de los problemas del sector es que muchos dispensarios legales no pueden competir con las tiendas ilegales, que pueblan sobre todo la ciudad de Nueva York.

MedMen looked to become the Apple of pot, the first mainstream, nationwide consumer brand for the product that drove so many Americans to ingest and invest. Marijuana liberalization was sweeping the country. A nascent industry was taking shape. No company was better poised to reap the rewards than MedMen was. Then, it all began to unravel. 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...