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Pioneering market:
Cannabis shops have already established themselves in Canadian cities like Toronto
Photo: Eckhard Stengel / IMAGO
The traffic light parties do not necessarily have to be the first to create a new market. With "addiction prevention and protection of minors" the SPD, Greens and FDP justify why they want to release the consumption of cannabis in a controlled manner, even without medical reasons. And yet, "pulling the ground out of the black market" should also mean, in return, paving the way for billions in legal business.
It is true that the SPD only wants to allow "model projects from federal states and municipalities" in its election program, while the FDP and the Greens advocate nationwide regulated sales in licensed specialist shops. But at least the FDP is already calculating what could jump out of it for the state treasury: "Up to a billion euros annually" can be earned with cannabis analogous to the tobacco tax - an absolute exception that the party once explicitly advocates new taxes. The Düsseldorf economist Justus Haucap even considers a positive budgetary effect of 2.7 billion euros to be possible, including value added tax, trade tax and saved costs, for example with the police. In line with the ongoing coalition negotiations, Haucap wants to deliver new figures.
Such sums would not be a game changer for public finances - but a sign that a relevant market is emerging. Michael Sassano, head of the major supplier Somaí, estimates that across Europe, medicinal cannabis, which has been approved in some countries, would generate sales of around 400 million euros. Germany, which has been involved since 2017, has by far the largest share. For the German market, which has so far been fully financed by the health insurance companies, the German Pain Society gives almost 90 million euros in the first half of 2021. The trend is rising sharply, despite all the restrictions: Doctors are only allowed to prescribe the intoxicant on a prescription if there is no alternative.
Nonetheless, the consulting firm Prohibition Partners expects the German medical cannabis business alone to skyrocket to more than a billion euros as soon as domestic cultivation comes onto the market on a large scale.
That should be the case in the coming year, delayed due to the corona.
Three companies have a license from the Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices for hemp cultivation in German bunkers.
In July, the market leader Tilray reported on the first harvest in Neumünster.
The competitors Aurora in Leuna and Demecan in the district of Meißen want to follow suit.
Starting advantage for the Canadians
Demecan is a start-up from Berlin with entrepreneurs from medium-sized companies such as Krombacher and Schleich or the Hessian Futury Fund behind them, the other two companies are listed cannabis companies from Canada - with a huge starting advantage: The North American country is the first in 2018 and so far the only one in the world to have gone the route of commercial release without major restrictions.
In the Netherlands, coffee shops are only tolerated, not allowed - and they still get their goods illegally; Model projects are sought for legalization. Uruguay has the weed distributed through pharmacies, only to citizens and in limited quantities. Luxembourg, ruled by a traffic light coalition under liberal leadership, has just legalized private cultivation and consumption - but not trade. In the USA, most states have now allowed smoking weed, but each with their own rules for the local markets and so far in conflict with federal laws that hinder access to banks, even where business is legal.
Only in Canada has a billion-dollar industry for cannabis as a luxury food to be established.
The companies there are therefore ready if further markets open up - and the German could be in the lead under the traffic light coalition.
Tilray CEO Irwin Simon promises shareholders "to seize the nearly $ 200 billion global cannabis market opportunity."
Simon, previously at the helm of competitor Aphria, merged the two market heavyweights in May.
As the number one in Canada and Germany, Tilray is now promoting its chances of entering the market.
The large production facilities in Portugal, where cultivation is also permitted in the greenhouse instead of in the bunker, make the Canadians pioneers in legal EU business.
Pharmacies as an entry helper
As a rule, the companies go to great lengths to emphasize the purely medical focus as seriously as possible and not to allow any association with smoking weed as a mere pleasure.
From an investor's point of view, however, the logic is too compelling: Miguel Martin, head of Tilray's Canadian competitor Aurora, speaks of "expanding into the global adult leisure business as medical regulations evolve".
Aurora has taken over Pedanios, the largest supplier for German pharmacies.
Those who have built up know-how and supply chains for medical cannabis can also sell the drugs to a much larger number of recreational users - or vice versa, if one overestimates oneself with sales planning for self-payers.
This has happened in Canada in the past few years.
The prospect of a cannabis bonanza has led to an oversupply there, especially since many customers still prefer the cheap, often harder goods from the black market despite the legal option.
Aurora, with the claim to particularly high-quality products, could not enforce the corresponding premium prices and recently posted an annual loss of 3.3 billion Canadian dollars (2.3 billion euros).
Some hopefuls also fell by the wayside.
The Berlin-based company Demecan was able to buy its Saxon hemp plant from the bankruptcy estate of Wayland, formerly known as Maricann.
New hopes for the USA and Europe
Red numbers are common in the industry, although mostly not as pronounced as in Aurora.
The majority stake in Canopy Growth, another Canadian cannabis group - with European headquarters in Frankfurt am Main, which brings together various German company acquisitions under the name Spectrum Therapeutics - wiped out almost all of the profits of the beer, wine and spirits giant Constellation Brand in the past quarter.
As a future business, cannabis should offset the foreseeable decline of the alcohol industry.
Now Canopy Growth wants to strengthen itself with the US acquisition Wana, the leading seller of food such as fruit gums with cannabis additives.
Condition for the deal announced in mid-October: the approval of the deal at the federal level, which is currently being negotiated by Congress in Washington.
The US group Curaleaf has patiently prepared for this opportunity and built up the cannabis business in 23 different states according to local rules.
Curaleaf Chairman Boris Jordan sees a "strong basis for future growth".
In the spring, the Americans gained a second mainstay by taking over the London company Emmac for $ 286 million, which operates two hectares of cultivation space in Portugal and also supplies the German medical cannabis market.
"In the long term," said Jordan, the entry into Europe would bring "a potential market that is twice the size of the United States".