Aurora Cannabis Sales Spike 260% after legalization in Canada

Aurora Cannabis (ACB) reported better-than-expected fiscal Q1 financial results Monday morning. This earnings report is the company’s first since Canada legalized the recreational use of marijuana last month.

The Canadian cannabis company saw C$29.7 million in revenue for Q1, which was up 260% year over year.

“The commencement of adult consumer use sales in Canada has been very successful for Aurora, with strong performance across all product categories and brands. … Given the strong unmet consumer demand evident across Canada, we are confident that our rapidly increasing production capacity will result in continued acceleration of revenue growth,” CEO Terry Booth said in a statement on Monday.

Aurora reported gross margins on cannabis of 70%, and that 12% increase year over year was primarily due to the higher average selling price of dried cannabis, according to the company.

The amount of cannabis produced and sold also increased significantly during the quarter. Compared to the same period in 2018, kilograms produced and sold rose 395% and 201% respectively.

Booth said that Aurora will be focused on more than doubling their production within months. “Based on grow rooms in production, the company currently is running at an annualized run rate of 70,000 kg. Management anticipates that around calendar year end 2018 into the beginning of calendar 2019, Aurora will have a production run rate in excess of 150,000 kg per annum based on grow rooms in production, with subsequent scale up to over 500,000 kg per annum (excluding additional capacity through the acquisition of ICC Labs).”