5 top VCs told us where they plan to place their cannabis bets in 2020, from scooping up distressed assets to the rise of new markets in Germany and China

Altitude Investment Management

To Trauben, 2019 was less about what went wrong in the cannabis industry, but rather what went right.

In 2018, Trauben says “there was a lot of fast money trying to play an irrational exuberance game.”

“I understand the pain people have felt,” Trauben said. “But I think we’re coming to a healthy point, which is, ‘let’s stop talking about the fast money trade and let’s talk about a real industry.'”

To that end, Trauben said his fund is looking at growth-stage investment opportunities across the cannabis industry.

In the US, that means companies that are either in good shape and looking for capital, or distressed opportunities.

“These growth-stage companies are boxing out the remnants of the startup cycle,” says Trauben. “So we think the startup cycle is pretty much over.”

On top of that, Trauben’s firm is staffing up in Europe, as major markets like Germany move toward a medical cannabis framework.

As Europe legalizes, companies there are taking their playbooks from the “vertically-integrated” strategies that companies had developed to capture the US and Canadian markets.

“That’s a clear opportunity for us,” says Trauben.

Altitude, a New York City-based fund started by veterans of the hedge fund and private equity world, raised a new $100 million fund last winter.