US House passes bill giving pot businesses access to banking

US House passes bill giving pot businesses access to banking

https://ca-times.brightspotcdn.com/d...4a694c8008d12d[FILE - In this Aug. 15, 2019, file photo, marijuana grows at an indoor cannabis farm in Gardena, Calif. The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2019, that would grant legal marijuana businesses access to banking, a measure that would clear up a longstanding headache for the industry. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel, File) (ASSOCIATED PRESS)

By GENE JOHNSON ASSOCIATED PRESS
SEP. 25, 2019 4:33 PM

U.S. House bill giving pot business access to banking and making it harder to detect theft, tax evasion and money laundering.

Supporters of the banking bill, including Democratic Reps. Denny Heck of Washington and Ed Perlmutter of Colorado, characterized it as a public safety measure. In urging lawmakers to vote yes, Heck relayed the story of a 24-year-old Marine veteran, Travis Mason, who was shot and killed during a robbery of a dispensary in suburban Denver in 2016.

“Because the federal law did not allow for that business to be banked, to be within the guardrails of the financial system, an evil person walked in that night and shot Travis dead,” Heck said. “That does not have to happen. It is not hypothetical.”

Rob Nichols, president of the American Bankers Association, called the vote “a significant step forward for public safety, transparency and common sense.”

“By helping to provide clarity for the financial sector in those states where cannabis is legal, this bill will help banks meet the needs of their communities while reducing cash-motivated crimes, increasing the efficiency of tax collections and improving the cannabis industry’s financial accountability,” he said.

Opponents said it would facilitate the spread of marijuana. In a written statement, Kevin Sabet of the anti-legalization group Smart Approaches to Marijuana, noted that hundreds of people have been sickened and several have died after using marijuana vaping products.

“Surely this is not the time to reward Big Marijuana with investment opportunities,” Sabet said.

“Granting this industry access to banks will bring billions of dollars of institutional investment from the titans of addiction and vastly expand the harms we are already witnessing.”
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Gene Johnson is a member of the AP’s marijuana beat team and can be followed at https://twitter.com/GeneAPseattle

Follow AP’s complete marijuana coverage: https://apnews.com/Marijuana

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com...ess-to-banking

Columbia Care Launches Cannabis Credit Card

ByPYMNTS
Posted on June 13, 2019

https://securecdn.pymnts.com/wp-cont...redit-card.jpg


Columbia Care, a medical cannabis company that has licenses in 15 jurisdictions in the European Union and the U.S., is launching the Columbia National Credit program with its new CNC Card, according to a release by the company.

Launch of the credit card comes after a successful test run in New York. This is the first time consumers in the United States can use a credit card to buy cannabis, the company said.

The program will expand to Delaware and Pennsylvania later in June and then into Arizona and Illinois. The company plans to have the card available to all of its markets by the end of the year. It will first be available at Columbia Care dispensaries only, but the company is looking into partnerships with other companies.

“We are in the business of expanding the entire national cannabis market, and this is exactly the type of industry-wide challenge our team excels at solving. By launching the first credit card in the country that can be used by consumers and industry participants to purchase cannabis products, we now exclusively offer an important capability that will serve Columbia Care’s national growth initiatives, including home delivery, automatic fulfillment and e-commerce,” said Nicholas Vita, chief executive officer of Columbia Care. “If given the choice to pay with credit or cash, consumers prefer credit, and until now, the cannabis industry has been predominantly cash-based due to restrictions on the use of credit cards for cannabis purchases.”

When the company launched the card in New York, it noticed that basket size increased 18 percent when the card was used. Also upon introduction of the card, home delivery users became the company’s fastest growing segment.

“We are encouraged by the overall results of our pilot program and the impact it has had on our home delivery customers, who are often unable to visit our dispensaries for a variety of reasons,” Vita said. “Based on our success in New York, one of the most demanding retail markets in the world, we are confident that the CNC Card has the potential to be a significant value add for the company and for all of our customers who look to us for reliable and convenient high-quality health and wellness options.”
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