Category: Financial

Starting a cannabis business legally under state law requires owners to consider a wide range of possible challenges. Some of the major considerations include possible federal enforcement issues if the DEA changes its stance regarding the Cole Memo; concerns with banking because many FDIC-insured banks do not want to handle…

Somewhere along the line, you made the difficult choice to become a part of the cannabis industry, which is fraught with risk of both criminal prosecution and excessive IRS scrutiny (read: disproportionate audit risk and huge tax rates). While we cannot predict what the current administration will do, we have…

Taxes are one of many conflicts between state and federal laws pertaining to the cannabis industry. States that have legalized cannabis for medical or recreational use treat all business alike, allowing the same deductions and credits for business expenditures. Under federal tax laws, however, most cannabis-related businesses are prohibited from…

Most commercial cannabis businesses, whether they are “touching the flower” or providing ancillary services to the industry, are small, family-owned businesses. In this article, I hope to impress on small family business owners the importance of succession planning with four tips entrepreneurs should consider in succession plan development. Succession Planning…

Early in 2016, industry leaders worried that too many marijuana ballot initiatives could spread resources too thin, leading to losses at the polls. November’s election, though, saw recreational or medicinal measures pass in eight of nine states. With multiple other states authorizing medical marijuana or new regulatory structures earlier in…

Anybody involved in the cannabis industry has probably heard about Internal Revenue Code Section 280E, which was originally developed in response to a famous U.S. Tax Court case. Craig W. Smalley is the CEO and co-founder of CWSEAPA (www.cwseapa.com) and Tax Crisis Center (www.taxcrisiscenter.com), which both have locations in Florida,…

After a bruising election season, most Americans are relieved it’s finally over. And if you listen carefully, you’ll hear the engines of business revving up, especially in the eight new legal cannabis markets. Cannabis growers in these states have been waiting with bated breath for new opportunities to expand their…

    Tipping has always been a standard practice in the service industry. It allows customers to express gratitude to servers and rewards those who provide excellent service. And from an employer’s perspective, encouraging customer tipping is an excellent way to augment employees’ wages without incurring additional operating costs. But…

It’s no secret that the cannabis industry is growing quicker than the plants themselves. As cultivation facilities develop and expand across the country, energy consumption in states like Colorado and California are on the rise. Keeping the cannabis industry green is a challenge in itself and it’s important for brands…

Valuing a cannabis-related business would not be much different from valuing any other business except that this business is based on a product that is illegal to grow and sell under current federal law. How this challenge is dealt with in states that have legalized it is the focus of…