Shares briefly hit $300 as Tilray CEO touts growth

Investor Peter Thiel and equity fund in line for a windfall

BRANDON KOCHKODIN, JEN SKERRITT AND CRAIG GIAMMONA The massive surge in the price of the stock of Canadian marijuana producer Tilray Inc. has delivered a multibilliondollar windfall for a little-known private equity fund backed by U.S. investor Peter Thiel.

Privateer Holdings Inc., a Seattlebased fund started seven years ago to focus on the marijuana business, holds 76 per cent of Tilray, a stake now worth more than $12 billion after the stock soared more than 10-fold from its July public offering.

Tilray, a B.C.-based company with just $20 million in revenue last year, has benefited from the surge in demand for pot stocks as Canada gears up to legalize the drug next month.

Companies including Coca-Cola and Diageo show interest in the sector.

On Tuesday, the company announced it had received approval to export a medical cannabis product to the U.S. for use in a clinical trial.

The company will be exporting capsules with two active ingredients extracted from the cannabis plant for a clinical trial as a potential treatment for essential tremor, a neurological disorder.

Thiel’s Founders Fund became the first institutional investor in the cannabis industry through Privateer Holdings’ $75 million Series B financing round in December 2014, according to the company’s website.

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