First Ever Cannabis-Based ETF to Include PharmaCyte Biotech, Abbott Laboratories, and GW Pharmaceuticals
February 23 2017 - 9:15AM
Marketwired
First Ever Cannabis-Based ETF to Include PharmaCyte Biotech,
Abbott Laboratories, and GW Pharmaceuticals
NEW YORK, NY-(Marketwired - February 23, 2017) - PharmaCyte
Biotech (OTCQB: PMCB) will join GW Pharmaceuticals, Abbott
Laboratories and 66 other publicly traded companies in what could
be the first ever cannabis exchange-traded fund (ETF) - the
Emerging AgroSphere ETF. One week ago, ETF Managers Group,
headquartered in Summit, New Jersey, filed an initial registration
statement with the SEC to become the first of its kind in the ETF
industry
(https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1467831/000114420417009539/v459698_485apos.htm).
According to the filing, the proposed fund will be focused on
medical cannabis and "will not invest in any companies that are
focused on serving the non-medical marijuana market in the United
States, Canada or any other country unless and until such time as
the production and sale of non-medical marijuana becomes legal in
the United States, Canada or such other country, respectively."
Now ETF Managers Group will wait for the SEC to approve the
fund, and, if approved, investors can own a piece of the 69
companies that make up the proposed fund all under one ETF. This,
of course, means that fund managers will need to buy up shares of
the companies that make up the fund, which should increase the
liquidity of each of these companies. The index composition can be
viewed at:
https://www.solactive.com/indices/?indexmembers=DE000SLA1CR1
PharmaCyte Biotech, GW Pharmaceuticals, Abbot Laboratories,
Cannabis Science Inc., Medical Marijuana Inc. and the 64 other
companies that will make up the proposed ETF, will fall into one of
the following three categories. The companies will either be (i)
engaged in lawful medical research intended to lead to the
production of government approved prescription drugs which utilize
natural or synthetic versions of the cannabinoid, cannabidiol
(CBD), and other cannabis based extracts, (ii) involved in the
production or sale of products which are legal derivatives of
industrial hemp, or (iii) involved in the supply chain of either
category of company.
PharmaCyte Biotech's work in medical cannabis began when it
acquired an exclusive, worldwide license to use its Cell-in-a-Box
technology in combination with genetically modified non-stem cell
lines which are designed to activate cannabinoid molecules for
development of treatments for diseases and their related
symptoms.
In contrast to the work being done by PharmaCyte's competitors,
the company plans to combine the Cell-in-a-Box live-cell
encapsulation technology with cannabinoids to develop a unique
therapy for difficult-to-treat and deadly forms of cancer, such as
brain cancer. Some cannabinoids are prodrugs that must be converted
into their cancer-killing form. These prodrugs will be used with
the Cell-in-a-Box technology in ways that optimize their anticancer
properties while minimizing or even eliminating adverse side
effects that normally occur with chemotherapy to treat cancer.
PharmaCyte says that it plans to focus initially on developing
specific therapies based on carefully chosen cannabinoid molecules
rather than using complex Cannabis extracts. The company believes
an understanding of the chemical and biochemical processes involved
in the interaction of substances derived from Cannabis with
live-cell encapsulation will provide the opportunity to develop
targeted "green" approaches to treating cancers, such as
pancreatic, brain, breast and prostate, among others.
PharmaCyte entered into a Research Agreement with the University
of Northern Colorado (UNC). The goal of the ongoing research at UNC
is to develop methods for the identification, separation and
quantification of cannabinoids (which will act like prodrugs) that
the company says may be used in combination with its Cell-in-a-Box
technology to treat various diseases, beginning with brain and
pancreatic cancers.
Initial studies were undertaken at UNC on behalf of PharmaCyte
using "cannabinoid-like" model compounds to identify the
appropriate cell type that can convert the selected cannabinoid
prodrugs into metabolites with anticancer activity. UNC is now
working with cannabinoid prodrugs from Cannabis to identify the
appropriate cell type for the same purpose. Once identified, the
genetically modified cells that will produce the appropriate enzyme
to convert the cannabinoid prodrugs will be encapsulated using
PharmaCyte's Cell-in-a-Box technology. The encapsulated cells and
cannabinoid prodrugs identified by these studies will then be
combined and used for future studies to evaluate their anticancer
effectiveness.
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