No Banks? No Problem: How One Company Is Fixing The Cannabis Industry’s Capital Bottleneck
“When we unlock cash flow for a business, we’re not just lending money—we’re fueling growth,” says Adam Stettner, founder and CEO of FundCanna. With a career spanning three decades in finance, Stettner has built a reputation for creating financial products that prioritize client needs, a philosophy he brings to the underserved cannabis industry.
A Lifelong Passion For Numbers
For Stettner, numbers have always been more than calculations: they’re tools for solving problems. “I’ve always been more comfortable with numbers than with letters or words,” he explains. “I see trends in numbers that help me make sense of things in a way I can’t with other mediums.” This innate knack for identifying trends laid the foundation for a career defined by innovation and adaptability.
Stettner’s professional journey began in New York’s apparel industry, where he immersed himself in manufacturing, distribution and sales. But it was the financial side of operations—how businesses funded inventory and production—that truly captivated him. This curiosity carried him to Wall Street and later to student lending, where he oversaw $14 billion in on-balance-sheet originations in just five years.
His expertise in designing financial products to meet real business needs led him to Reliant Funding, a company he founded. There, he helped deliver over $3 billion in on-balance-sheet funding to nearly 100,000 small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) across the U.S., underwriting more than a million SMB funding applications. These experiences reinforced his belief in rethinking traditional lending structures to better serve business owners.
“Too often, financial products are built around rigid credit boxes,” Stettner says. “If you don’t fit the box, you don’t get funded. I wanted to change that by understanding the client first, then designing a product that fits them.”
This client-first ethos became the driving force behind the launch of FundCanna in 2021. Recognizing that cannabis was essential, rapidly growing and underserved by financial institutions, Stettner saw an opportunity to apply his expertise to one of the industry’s biggest hurdles: access to capital.
“Cannabis was an obvious next step,” he says. “The industry is grossly underserved when it comes to financing.”
Bridging The Cannabis Financing Gap
FundCanna is Stettner’s response to the cannabis industry’s unique financial challenges. Despite the $35 billion annual market, cannabis remains federally illegal, making banks hesitant to lend. A 2022 survey from Whitney Economics revealed that over 70% of licensed cannabis companies identified the “lack of access to banking or investment capital” as their top challenge, underscoring the severe funding bottleneck in the industry. Even ancillary businesses such as equipment suppliers face barriers to accessing financing.
“The cannabis industry has a fundamental mismatch between cash outlay and revenue,” Stettner explains. Cannabis businesses are often caught in a …