Tag: AdvisorShares Vice ETF (ACT)

The Second Marijuana ETF Is Now Open For Business

Posted on by Matt Thalman

The AdvisorShares Pure Cannabis ETF (YOLO), the second pure play Marijuana Exchange Traded Fund began trading on Thursday, April 18th, (it would have been fun if the market had been open on April 20th). The fund is a direct competitor to the ETFMG Alternative Harvest ETF (MJ), the only other US traded marijuana ETF.

(It should be noted that the AdvisorShares Vice ETF (ACT) also is heavily invested in marijuana and cannabis stocks, but it also has a large percentage of its portfolio in tobacco and alcohol-related business, which have no connection to the marijuana industry).

The two funds will be direct competitors, but not because they are investing in the same companies due to the differences in each fund’s principal investing strategy based on their ‘Fund Prospectus,’ but solely because they are the only two ETF’s primarily focusing on cannabis-related businesses.

YOLO’s fund prospectus states the following; Continue reading "The Second Marijuana ETF Is Now Open For Business" →

A Few Marijuana ETFs For U.S. Investors

Posted on by Matt Thalman

The marijuana industry is taking North America by storm, well maybe that happened back in the ’60s, but now the legal marijuana industry is doing it today. Despite the fact that the U.S. Federal Government still considers marijuana a Schedule I substance and therefore illegal, it appears the “pot” movement is taking hold as 29 U.S. States have already legalized the use of medical marijuana and another eight have legalized marijuana for recreational use.

This movement has drawn the attention of everyday investors and those on Wall Street. Over the past few years, we have seen an explosion of small, risky, marijuana investments pop up. The sheer number of options has been overwhelming and very risky for average investors to get involved with, but that is all changing very quickly.

In the spring of 2017 the first marijuana ETF, Horizons Marijuana Life Sciences Index ETF (HMMJ), debuted. This was investors first chance to buy into the industry without taking on ‘single-stock’ risk in a very fragmented and risky industry.

The big issue though with HMMJ is that it is a Canadian ETF and thus it trades on the Toronto Stock exchange. That means for U.S. based investors it was either difficult, as in their online broker wouldn’t allow them to buy the investment, or very expensive, as in $60 per transaction (that is $60 trading commission to buy and $60 to sell it). Continue reading "A Few Marijuana ETFs For U.S. Investors" →