Slang Worldwide Inc., co-founded by Peter Miller, a Canadian, and Billy Levy, an American, began trading at $1.50 a share Tuesday, and closed up 33 percent at C$1.99, according to CSE data.
The Toronto-based company has a portfolio of established and growing cannabis branded products sold in 2,600 retail stores across 10 U.S. states, where it derives the majority of its revenue and product sales.
Slang Worldwide bills itself as a consumer packaged goods company and does not wish to get involved in growing the plant itself, according to Market Watch.
Prior to its IPO, Slang raised $66 million in financing and acquired Denver-based Organa Brands and its subsidiary Organa Labs that focuses on the extraction, refining, and distilling of cannabis oils used in consumer products, including some manufactured under the Slang brand name.
Miller describes the acquisition as a merger, setting the company up to streamline its production of one of its most widely recognized products, O.penVAPE. “The O.pen, it’s one of the highest selling cannabis goods in the history of the legal industry,” Miller told Yahoo Finance. “It has become so popular that people just refer to vape pens like it as O.pens.”
Under its 12 brands, Slang also sells vape hardware and cannabis seeds and strains and plans to bring flower and pre-roll joints to market.
Canopy Growth is backing Slang through a complex financial arrangement that it uses to comply with the Toronto Stock Exchange’s policy of de-listing pot business that operates in territories where cannabis is federally illegal, as it is in the U.S.
Canopy Growth has a warrant that will allow it to acquire 32 million shares in Slang, or about 15 percent of the company if and when cannabis becomes legal in the United States, reports the Financial Post.
“Ultimately we care about one thing and pretty much one thing only, and that’s getting the most servings of cannabis into the world with our brands on them,” Miller said.
