Oren Bitan

Oren Bitan is a Buchalter shareholder and the co-chair of the firm’s cannabis industry law group. He deploys his extensive background in business, real estate, banking, receivership, consumer products, intellectual property and commercial law to advise cannabis businesses on their specialized legal needs. And he marshals a team of 35 attorneys in the cannabis group as needed to handle more than 100 clients’ corporate affairs, mergers and acquisitions and other services.

In an April panel discussion titled “The Cannabiz!,” Bitan hosted the president of cultivator and manufacturer Glass House Brands Inc., the CEO of cannabis financial services company Trellis LLC and the vice president of retail at Farmacy.

Bitan has been with Buchalter for 13 years. “Early on, we saw a need when one of our clients was appointed to a receivership over a nonprofit cannabis collective,” Bitan said. “We came to represent lenders and factors in the industry, and we created what we called a ‘green rider’ to leasing contracts and other instruments that incorporate existing laws into their agreements.”

At first, Bitan said, he and his colleagues carefully screened clients and operated under special rules to protect the firm in a quasi-legal space. The lack of banking services required him to take payments in cash at times. “Today, we’re much more comfortable with our cannabis business, and we get paid by check or wire.”

His expertise in the financial field allows Bitan to lecture on topics such as banking and lending issues in the cannabis industry and the complexities of managing risk under state and federal law.

He discussed cannabis banking considerations at the National Cannabis Industry Association’s third annual CannaVest West expo in December 2021.

“Some banks and credit unions now take cannabis business accounts and do some lending,” he said. “Financial institutions have been making slow progress as they edge into the industry. And we have seen very little friction with federal regulators, notwithstanding the legal roadblocks imposed by federal laws against cannabis.”

Banking is just one of the challenges facing the industry. “It’s having a very hard time with taxes and competition with unlicensed entities,” Bitan said. Even so, certain fundamentals are strong. “The industry’s labor stats are impressive. In 2021, cannabis was the second-highest job-creating industry nationally.”

Another helpful sign: “Smaller cities that authorize cannabis licenses are moving to enforce the law against unlicensed operators by going after property owners who lease to them,” he said. “It’s been a game of whack-a-mole, but cities have learned that property owners are a reliable target in the effort to aid licensed operators. Cities see that it is to their advantage to encourage taxpaying cannabis businesses and discourage the outlaws.”

– John Roemer