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Chicago missed out on a standard white Christmas, however sturdy weed gross sales made for a inexperienced vacation season throughout the state.
Leisure hashish gross sales hit a brand new excessive in December at almost $138 million, up 14% from the earlier month, in accordance with the Illinois Division of Monetary and Skilled Regulation.
The December whole smashes the earlier report set in July, when Illinois leisure weed gross sales hit $128 million, helped by a late-month enhance from attendees on the annual Lollapalooza music festival in Chicago, trade analysts stated.
For the yr, Illinois leisure gross sales reached almost $1.38 billion, greater than doubling the entire from 2020, the primary yr of authorized leisure marijuana gross sales within the state. Illinois legalized medical marijuana gross sales in 2015.
The state’s 110 dispensaries offered greater than 30 million weed merchandise throughout 2021, with almost a 3rd of the leisure hashish revenues generated by out-of-state clients, in accordance with the state.
Illinois has but to launch medical marijuana gross sales for December, however sufferers spent $362 million on prescribed merchandise by means of 11 months, placing the state on monitor to generate almost $1.8 billion in whole retail hashish gross sales for 2021.
Gross sales have been ramping up since Illinois legalized leisure marijuana in January 2020. The state generated $1.03 billion in whole hashish gross sales throughout 2020, together with $669 million in leisure weed and greater than $366 million in medical gross sales.
Illinois is considered one of 18 states which have legalized leisure marijuana use, which continues to be prohibited by federal regulation. However public sentiment and political pressure for federal decriminalization are mounting as extra states legalize hashish, fueling fast development of the nascent trade.
Hashish analysis agency Headset tasks authorized U.S. weed gross sales to surpass $30 billion this yr and attain $45.8 billion by 2025. Illinois is projected to generate $2.55 billion in annual hashish gross sales by 2025, in accordance with Headset.
Final summer season, Illinois awarded 185 new leisure dispensary licenses by means of three lotteries with a give attention to social fairness candidates, however the rollout has been delayed by lawsuits challenging the process in Prepare dinner County Circuit Court docket.
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