You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio. So we did see some gains and movement, actually wide swing, about a six or seven percent swing in cannabis stocks today as the US House of Representatives is expected to approach a vote on a bill that would decriminalize marijuana. And keeping with that, we also got a financial update on one of the companies in the space we're talking about,
Truly Cannabis out this morning. Fourth quarter revenue inline adjusted EBITDA a miss and the company's forecast mr analyst forecast based on Bloomberg data. The stock, we did see some movement in it as well, finishing kind of unchanged on the day after an earlier rally. Yeah, a little bit of allatility when it comes to cannabis stocks. I think that's an understatement over the last year. Kim Rivers is CEO of Truly. If she joins us on the phone
from for via zoom excuse me from Tallahassee, Florida. Kim, good to chat with you again. Um, let's start with the quarter and then we'll move into the legislation that's well, perhaps making its way through Congress because we've we've seen this story before. UM fourth quarter earnings reporting record revenue of ninety eight million dollars, up eight percent year over year. UM,
give us your takeaway from the quarter. Yeah, well, first of all, thank you so much for having me and UM, you know, it was a phenomenal quarter for truly, I'm really proud of our team. UM of course ended the year up eighty percent, following UM a year of a hundred and five percent growth the year before, so two consecutive years of just of just you know, really incredible incredible growth top line bottom line finished UM ibadad which
again this is the strongest in the in the industry. UM. We of course completed the largest cannabis acquisition to date, closing our acquisition of Harvest Health and Recreation in October. So how much remind me how that was? For that was UM, well, it's the headline number was two was two billion. UM. We did to share exchange ratio, so it ended up coming in UM a bit under that given the given the as you mentioned, volatility in the market, UM coming into your d um so and it took
our portfolio from four states. UM and we entered in the to exiting the year with eleven states and an impressive retail leading network of a hundred and fifty nine store locations and cultivation and production um north of three point five billion square feet. So how has this story around and the reality in terms of the cannabis market?
You know? Can I feel like we've been talking about it for several years, right, We've all been excited about it, UM waiting for more you know, kind of regulatory oversight, legitimization here. And it does feel like there was a momentum earlier in the day out of expectations that the House is expected to do a vote on a bill this week. Where are we in this process? You know, from where we've come over the last couple of years
to where we are today? How would you describe it? Yeah? So, I mean I think it's been of course, as as folks who have been following cannabis would I'm sure agree, a bit of a roller coaster. Um. If you know, if we're if we're really looking at the macro picture from a from a federal reform perspective, I want a caveat that heavily by saying that UM our business and other businesses like US and which our plant touching US
operator operators. And that's an important distinction, um, because we are not able to list on the on the regular exchanges, right, We're not We're not able to list on the n y C or on the NASDACK And so it's always a little frustrating and interesting because you see big moves to the positive UM with companies that are quote cannabis companies, those are actually Canadian operators with Canadian operate operations um, and so they actually can't benefit from federal change UM
in the in the near term. Um. Yeah, those are the stocks because they're the only stocks available on those exchanges that see the positive gains today. But still an indicator of kind of sentiment, right, like I mean, invest your sentiment comes from a lot of different places. Yeah, d percent, a hundred percent and so UM. What we see in the other caveat, I would say is that
the state momentum has not slowed down. And to the fundamentals of our business when we talk about any percent revenue growth strong even on margins um you know, portfolio expansion, etcetera. That really is grounded in the state regulatory structure that is continuing to evolve in a real and meaningful way. Right Maryland right now is actually in session. Expect to build a pass with a follow up amendment to their
to their constitution around recreational cannabis. Of course, all the talk out of New York and New Jersey, we've got Georgia who's about to launch a medical program. A number of Southern markets actually who are about to launch medical are in different varying stages of launching medical programs. So is that the growth is a medical or recreational Well, it's both, right, so I think, you know, and it's somewhat regionalized. And you know, we've articulated this regional hub strategy.
That's one of the reasons you know in in Southern states, Um, you know we it is primarily launching medical programs to start Northeast and there are there's good penetration from a medical program perspective. So now it's just that that switchover to recreational. Um. Of course, outwest, Um, these are our legacy markets. They've been around and have both metal cool and recreational sales for over a decade. So there is varying parts of the country that are in various stages.
But to get back to your question on federal change, I think the thought process was with the Democrats uh, coming into into the majority in Congress, and of course with the presidency, the thought was that there would be meaningful change more quickly. Um. You know post election, Uh, you saw stocks and rally around that that sentiment, if you will, um, and and the hopes that we would see something more meaningful quickly. Unfortunately that has not been
the case. UM. You know. There have been a number of proposals that have come forward, but they haven't been able to get traction in both houses. UM. The More Act, as an example, which would expect to be voted on again on Friday, has already passed the House previously. UM. I would expect for it to have sound optimistic, Well,
I expected to pass again. I think the issue is is that it's just as in the Senate right in terms of whether or not we're going to see the ability to coalesce and reach a compromise that that can pass both houses. All right, we gotta run. Kim, Thank you so much. Kim Rivers. She's the chief executive officer of Truly via Zoom from Tallahassee