Cannabis giant TGOD plans to go public, aims to raise up to $100 million
Deal could catapult it to the Top 10 of Canada’s most valuable pot firms
Cannabis company The Green Organic Dutchman Ltd. plans to go public later this month in a muchanticipated deal that implies a market capitalization of more than $650-million.
Mississauga, Ont.-based TGOD filed an amended preliminary prospectus with securities regulators late Tuesday evening, announcing its plans to raise between $75 and $100 million. It filed an initial prospectus in mid February, but withheld key financial information about the deal at the time.
The company — which is one of the largest privately held cannabis companies in Canada — will issue between 20.5 million and 27.4 million units, made up of a common share and a half-share purchase warrant, at $3.65.
With 159 million common shares already outstanding, the deal will value TGOD above $650-million, putting it within the Top 10 most valuable Canadian cannabis companies.
Shares are expected to start trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange in the last week of March, although TGOD hasn’t announced an exact date.
The lead underwriters for the deal are Canaccord Genuity Corp. and PI Financial Corp., with Industrial Alliance Securities Inc., INFOR Financial Inc., Echelon Wealth Partners Inc. and Mackie Research Capital Corporation also acting as agents.
The IPO will be the largest in the space since MedReleaf Corp. went public last summer, raising $100 million in a disastrous IPO that saw prices fall 22 per cent on the first day of trading.
The offering from MedReleaf — which has since seen solid growth, despite the rocky start — happened amid fears that cannabis stocks were overpriced. That fear still stalks the market, even after a dramatic decline in cannabis stock prices at the end of January and early February.
TGOD operates a small grow facility near Hamilton, Ont. which has yet to generate revenue from sales. The company has been successful, however, raising capital and securing key partnerships, including a $55-million investment from Aurora Cannabis Inc., which took a 17.6-per-cent stake in TGOD in January.
In September it acquired a 50-per-cent stake in a 75-acre property in Valleyfield, Que., where it intends to build an 820,000-square-foot greenhouse facility with the assistance of Aurora subsidiary Larssen Ltd., a greenhouse engineering company.
“By 2022, the Company expects to have a production capacity of approximately 116,000 kg per year of premium organic cannabis between the Hamilton Facility and Québec Facility,” the company said in its prospectus.
The company says it currently has $133 million in working capital. After the IPO, it will have between $204 million and $227 million in available funds, depending on the size of the offering.
It plans to spend $106.25 million building its facility in Valleyfield, and a further $27.3 million expanding its Hamilton facility. It plans to spend a further $22.5 million and $7.7 million, respectively, on research facilities on the Valleyfield and Hamilton sites.