This is an update on Dope Growers Society, the NFT opportunity I told you about recently.
The project will mint on Monday, Jan. 23, but information has come to light that raises questions that I cannot answer. Thus, I do not advise minting Dope Growers at this point.
There is a lack of clarity and certainty, and I have not been able to adequately address red flags that have been raised.
I will say up front that all of this concern could be for nothing. But I want to err on the side of caution.
Recently, I was contacted by a certified cannabis grower with retail operations in Thailand and who is now in the process of obtaining licensing in Portugal, where Dope Growers is based. He informed me that Dope Growers seems to be potentially tied to, or somehow connected to, a Portuguese “crowd-growing” marijuana company called Portugrow, which, based on internet searches, appears to have been a scam….
Let me say that the company behind Dope Growers is 100% legitimately registered in Portugal as a business. That much is true, but here are the red flags that have popped up:
1: A Dope Growers co-founder uses as his profile picture the exact same image visible on the Portugrow website. It’s not a generic image one might find in a Google search. It’s custom-made. The Dope Growers teams told me, “Yes, we use the image because why not. And [we] also took input from other crowd-growing campaigns.”
The team also says it has begun the process of “doxxing”—revealing the true identities of—team members, the company and the Portuguese license with Alder Mages, a service that verifies NFT team members as a way to give NFT minters a sense of comfort that the team is legit.
2: All weed companies in Portugal must be licensed through Infarmed, Portugal’s weed licensing agency. As I noted, the company behind Dope Growers is 100% registered in Portugal as a business, but I’ve found no Infarmed license. I have sent an email to Infarmed’s communications department, but have not heard back.
The Dope Growers team sent me a document, written in Portuguese, purportedly from Infarmed. Translated Portuguese acknowledges receipt of an application to cultivate/import/export weed, and says inspection is necessary before licensing. So, this is a pre-license application, not an operational license.
The now team says a final inspection will happen in February. Until I know for sure that Infarmed has granted a license, I’m erring on the side of caution.
3: The certified grower with retail operations in Thailand tells me Dope Grower’s expectations of selling wholesale cannabis into the German market at €4.50 per gram is wishful since the market is flooded with indoor-grown Colombian cannabis at under €3 per gram. That would impact Dope Growers’ income, which would impact the income NFT owners receive.
I checked spot prices for wholesale cannabis to get an idea of what’s real. In the U.S. as of Jan. 13, wholesale cannabis was selling for the equivalent of €1.99 per gram. Canadian spot was equal to €3.52 per gram. And as of Jan. 10, wholesale prices in Germany, where Dope Growers aims to sell its product, were €2.30 if sold to distributors and €4.20 for distributors selling to a pharmacy.
4: The certified grower told me that supplying cannabis to Germany for recreational use—a primary expansion plan for Dope Growers—won’t fly because Germany’s still-unfolding laws on recreational weed reportedly won’t allow importation of marijuana for recreational purposes. That claim appears to be accurate. A leaked government document notes that the import of cannabis products from abroad will be prohibited under the new recreational marijuana laws now being considered.
Dope Growers team told me that, “The German law is not 100% fixed and domestic production can’t fulfill demand so it needs to come from other EU countries.” This also is true, but only at the medical level right now, where importation is legal.
But everything written so far about the recreational laws says the market will be off-limits to importers for at least five years.
Finally, I’ve reached out to two German medical-weed wholesalers supposedly tied to the company behind Dope Growers. I haven’t heard back. Again, that’s neither good nor bad. But, again, I want assurances before I can feel confident backing a Dope Growers NFT.
The team tells me: “I wouldn’t risk [our business] for a 777 NFT rug. The cannabis business is a rough place. Lots of competition and bad competitors.” (A rug is where the team absconds with the mint funds.)
They say the certified grower who contacted me is one of those bad players.
Frankly, I am torn. The red flags concern me. And while some of the team’s answers are on-point, they don’t quell my fears completely.
The income potential of a Dope Growers NFT is off the charts, if true.
But just in case the concerns are legitimate, I don’t want to lose money. Each NFT is only $100 at this point, and each person on the whitelist can only mint one. So the potential loss is fairly minimal.
Nevertheless, I cannot in good conscience suggest supporting this project. I will be watching from the sidelines to see how this business shapes up, and if it turns out this is a legitimate opportunity, I will come back to you with further information.
