Traders on the Toronto Stock Exchange can now buy and sell “WEED.”
That’s the chosen stock ticker symbol for Canopy Growth Corp., an Ontario-based licensed producer that calls itself “the largest legal cannabis business in the world.”
“Patients, investors and Canadians as a whole are more accepting of the cannabis sector today than ever before,” said Canopy CEO Bruce Linton said in a statement. “This is owed to a lot of factors, but we are proud to have played our part in introducing a once-stigmatized topic into Main Street and Bay Street conversations.”
The company became the world’s first cannabis “unicorn” – an industry term for a startup that reaches $1 billion in value – last November amid a frenzy of trading following the U.S. federal election, when four states — California, Maine, Massachusetts and Nevada — legalized cannabis for recreational purposes. Traders drove up the prices of Canadian marijuana stocks, betting that these companies will get into the growing U.S. pot market.
The company’s stock ticker change came after it completed its purchase last month of scandal-plagued rival LP Mettrum, creating a marijuana giant whose nearly 40,000 customers account for around half of medical marijuana patients in Canada.