Emails revealed CannTrust CEO Peter Aceto knew as early as mid-November that his company was growing in unlicensed rooms.
Globe and Mail
- CannTrust director of quality and compliance, Graham Lee, wrote to Aceto and others on November 16 to report Health Canada did not snoop around the “unlicensed rooms currently full of plants.” Lee mentioned “current risks,” which also included a “large number of lost bottles [of product] we have not reported.”
- “Although serious, on their own, each of these can be talked through with [Health Canada],” Lee’s email reads. “The concern is that together they will paint a picture with the regulator of a company not in control. We have dodged observations for items 1 and 6 despite having HC in the building.”
- Minutes of weekly production meetings between November 14 and 28 show seven employees including three vice-presidents discussing illicit growing. Lee reported he had told Aceto about growing in unlicensed rooms and was told to “continue as planned.”
Bloomberg
Aceto was revealed to have appeared in a CannTrust promotional video filmed in early 2019 directly in front of unlicensed cultivation room RG8 (identified by five employees), clearly full of plants. This is the same room in which former employee Nick Lalonde alleged he was directed to install fake walls.
Financial Post
- Aceto was largely viewed as bringing legitimacy to the cannabis industry when he left his nine-year position as CEO of Tangerine bank to helm CannTrust last October.
Twitter—Jon Liedtke - On Thursday, the special committee of the board investigating the deliberate misleading of Health Canada fired Peter Aceto “with cause” and asked chairman and founding CEO Eric Paul to resign. CannTrust share prices had by then declined 60% since the story broke on July 8.
Globe and Mail - Figures across the sector—ranging from LP brass like Supreme founder John Fowler and TerrAscend founder Vijay Sappani to investors, to legacy growers and activists—called for regulators to show CannTrust no mercy.
Twitter - After news that Aceto and Paul were out, CannTrust shares rose as much as 20%.
Globe and Mail
Quick Hits
- Toronto seed-to-sale software company Ample Organics cut its staff from 120 to 102, across departments. CEO John Prentice said “capital is drying up in this space.”
Betakit - As stocks have declined in the wake of the CannTrust scandal, capital has been harder to get. This owes in part to CannTrust, which recently closed its April USD$200M offering with established financiers, whom the scandal humiliated.
Globe and Mail, Financial Post - Flowr withdrew its plans to make a $125M offering and list on Nasdaq due to market conditions.
Nasdaq