Cannabis advocates say banks still refuse their business, fuelling the illicit market and hurting the industry
Even the Cannabis Council of Canada, an industry lobby group, can't open an account with any of Canada's five major banks.
The refusal of Canada’s major banks to work with the legal cannabis industry represents a troubling lack of accountability while bolstering the black market, say industry advocates.
The problem is so bad that even the Cannabis Council of Canada, the Ottawa-based organization that lobbies on behalf of licensed cannabis businesses, can’t open an account at any of Canada’s five big banks.
“We don’t touch cannabis, we work with regulated players,” said George Smitherman, president and CEO of the Cannabis Council of Canada. “Still, the only (bank) we can get an account from is Alterna Savings.”
And even that doesn’t come cheap, he said.
“Because we’re in the cannabis space, they charge us $4,000 per year and $100 a month for basic banking services, and I’m talking about an organization with less than $1 million in annual activity,” Smitherman said.
Accessing banking is a well-worn problem across Canada’s licensed cannabis space.
As the country enters its sixth year of legal weed, Canada’s banks still have no interest in doing business with those who legally deal pot, or even organizations merely related to cannabis.
Upon opening his successful chain of MaryJane’s Cannabis shops in Toronto, Sam Gerges couldn’t even find a bank willing to let him open a business bank account, much less provide access to loans.
“We have zero dollars in debt, yet we can’t get a single loan,” Gerges told the National Post.
Since opening his flagship Etobicoke store in 2020 — ironically in a former TD Canada Trust bank branch — Gerges’ business steadily grew, eventually expanding to new stores in North York and Oshawa.
