Marijuana stock Tilray (TLRY) is tapping the equity market for new funding. The company has revealed in a regulatory filing that it is floating a secondary issue of stock.
Up to $400 million worth of Tilray's Class 2 common stock will be offered in the flotation and will be sold in collaboration with investment bank Cowen and Company. Tilray did not specify how many shares would be offered. At the most recent closing price of $30.71, that upper-limit $400 million would equate to just over 13 million shares.
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Tilray and Cowen will be cooperating closely, according to the filing. Tilray is to formally notify Cowen every time it wishes to sell stock under the agreement, specifying certain parameters for that divestment. Cowen will then be responsible for effecting the transaction.
Tilray did not specify when the new stock flotation would begin, nor how it plans to use the proceeds.
Like its peers, Tilray has been spending significant amounts of capital in order to build market share in various segments both in North America and abroad. Recent investments on these shores include the acquisition of the No. 1 hemp comestibles company, Manitoba Harvest, for $317 million, and a nearly $33 million expansion of its production and processing capacity.
Overseas, the company recently began operation of a cultivation and distribution facility in Portugal. This gives it a foothold in the potentially lucrative European Union market, assuming cannabis laws in the 28 EU states become more permissive than at present. Last month, Tilray announced that it signed a $3.3 million deal with a German medical cannabis importer to ship product from the facility to that country.
The new share sale follows the completion of Tilray's merger with Privateer Holdings, its largest single stockholder. In the somewhat byzantine merger, Tilray will effectively sell off Privateer's stake gradually over a two-year period.
The aim of this slow divestment seems to be to assuage investor fears of a large and sudden sale by Privateer, a move that would surely affect the stock price negatively. Privateer owns 75 million Tilray shares -- around 77% of the total.
