CHICAGO — The state of Illinois is having trouble finding a bank or financial services company to process the large amounts of cash it anticipates receiving for taxes and fees from the new medical marijuana industry. The state treasurer’s office received no response to an official solicitation published last fall, so Illinois State Treasurer Michael […]
Banking
Federal Banking Rules Pose a Problem for Medical Dispensaries in Illinois
Illinois residents now are free to apply for and receive licenses for medical marijuana prescriptions, and the state already has issued about 2,500 for patients with conditions that could be eased by use of the drug. But how can they buy their medications if the state’s limited number of licensed dispensaries can’t take their customers’ […]
Las Vegas Bank Now Says They Won’t Serve Cannabis Industry
A Las Vegas bank that planned to offer accounts to medical marijuana businesses has backed off, citing the astronomical cost of complying with federal regulations. First Security Bank of Nevada’s decision leaves some in the legal cannabis industry scrambling for a place to put their money just as they get ready to open for business. […]
Despite Changes by the Feds, Banks Are Still Keeping Their Distance From Cannabis Cash
The U.S. government has opened a new line of business for America’s biggest banks, and for once they don’t want it. Little wonder: it’s cash from legalized marijuana. The financial-crimes arm of the Treasury Department is making it easier to deposit the fledgling industry’s growing revenue, at last count nearly $3 billion annually and almost […]
Long Odds in Congress For Re-Introduced Marijuana Banking Bill
A bill sponsored by a Colorado Congressman that would allow legal marijuana dispensaries access to the federal banking system has been re-introduced to the House of Representatives — but it faces long odds. Representatives Ed Perlmutter of Colorado and Denny Heck back H.R. 2076 — the Marijuana Business Access to Banking Act of 2015. Why […]
Oregon’s MBank Decides to Close All of It’s Marijuana Accounts
MBank, the only bank in Oregon offering checking accounts to marijuana businesses, is closing all its weed accounts in the next two months. The Gresham-based bank will close the roughly 75 accounts it has opened for marijuana growers and sellers and other pot businesses, MBank president and CEO Jef Baker tells WW. “The rumor’s true,” Baker says. […]
Federal Reserve President Talks Banking Issues With Colorado Cannabis Industry
Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City president Esther George on Thursday listened intently to a group of 20 businessmen, bankers and government officials who talked about the troubling lack of banking services available to the marijuana industry, but offered little indication about how it could be resolved. In the first meeting of its kind, George […]
Congressman: Feds Don’t Want to Confront Anti-Marijuana Banking Laws
Congress doesn’t have the appetite to deal with the conflict between federal and state laws that has caused a banking crisis for the burgeoning marijuana industry in Colorado and other states, according to a member of a House committee that would take up the debate. Despite repeated calls for Congress to address federal rules that […]
Colorado’s Marijuana Industry Really Wants a Bank — But Waits on the Fed
It was zero degrees in Denver on a late December morning, and the ice-covered streets were mostly empty. Mark Mason, wearing a full-length black coat, green wool hat and sunglasses, sat in a white Buick LaCrosse, eyeing the squat building across the street. It was the local branch of the Federal Reserve Bank. “Behind that […]
Oregon’s MBank Opens Doors to Colorado Marijuana Businesses
An Oregon bank is openly offering service to the marijuana industry in Colorado at a time when banks here are lurking mostly in the shadows. MBank, based outside Portland, is part of a growing number of financial institutions, mostly Washington-based credit unions, that are banking openly with marijuana businesses. But it is the first to […]
