The Biggest Little Company In Cannabis: C21 Investments Dominates Reno, NV
By Todd Harrison via Cannabis Confidential (October 13)
After last week’s trip to Chicago for the BZ Cannabis Capital Conference, I headed west, young man, for a long-overdue sit-down with Sonny Newman, the founder & CEO of C21 Investments (OTC:CXXIF), Nevada’s first licensed operator in 2015.
When we began advising this company five years ago, there had been a change of control. Prior management was overly promotional, we learned, and Sonny retook control with a unique twist: he loaned the company over $30M dollars.
Fast forward to today: five straight years of positive free cash flow retired Sonny’s $30M in senior debt, paid $7.5M in 280E taxes and funded a $3M cultivation expansion. There have been no financings or shares issued. In fact, C21 reduced its fully diluted stack by 4% over that span.
Not only is C21 the only public cannabis company to pay off its senior debt via free cash flow, it’s also the only public cannabis company to have the same number of shares outstanding as it did at all-time highs; in short, Sonny is a shrewd steward of capital.
I was keen to meet this man, the cannabis equivalent of William Wallace, as our primary points of contact on the relationship were Bruce Macdonald (Chairman) and Sammy Armenia (VP), both of whom were slated to meet me in the northern Nevada desert.
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With Sammy a late scratch (flu), I finagled my way from Chicago (to LV to) Reno Wednesday night to meet Bruce …