Topic Hub

Cannabis Pro Formas

Leverage investment pitches and strengthen business plans that are presented to potential investors.

Demonstrate The Value of Your Cannabis Operation

A cannabis pro forma is a set of financial documents that demonstrate how funds are used or are going to be used, and how the money raised will impact a company’s financials. Individuals or firms who prepare a cannabis pro forma make supported assumptions in developing projections. They think carefully about ensuring the financial numbers are reasonable and provide insight into significant gains that a prospective buyer or investor can use to decide to purchase or fund the business. A pro forma can be used to leverage investment pitches and strengthen business plans that are presented to potential investors.

Latest Pro Forma Guidance

Cannabis Business License Application Help

We offer cannabis business license application help. Whether you’re looking for a dispensary license, cannabis manufacturing license, cannabis cultivation license, cannabis retail license, cannabis delivery

Cannabis Business License Value

Whether you’re trying to beef up your balance sheet or sell your cannabis business license, you need to put a thoughtful valuation together. Valuations follow

August Cannabis Industry Update

Special guest, California State Treasurer, Fiona Ma joined us to share more about her work in politics to help the cannabis industry and take some

How GreenGrowth CPAs Can Help Your Cannabis Pro Formas

Pro formas and financial projections are an essential tool in securing licenses, gaining access to credit, or winning over investors. Our comprehensive approach to pro formas utilizes the latest cannabis industry insights to show how you’ll disburse funds and make money.

A pro forma is a set of financial documents that demonstrates how investment funds will be used and impact a company’s financial position. These documents can be used to develop an operating budget to ensure that a business does not run out of money before it becomes profitable. When speaking to investors, a pro forma offers insight into how much capital or funding a company needs to raise. There are several key components to pro formas. They are:

  • Income Statement: This is also commonly referred to as a “Profit and Loss Statement” or P&L. Income Statements report income during a particular reporting period. It focuses on a business’ revenue, gains, expenses, and losses.
  • Balance Sheet: This is a financial statement that reports a company’s assets, liabilities, and shareholder’s equity during a specified reporting period. Balance Sheets also provide a basis for computing return rates and can assist in providing key insight into assessing a company’s capital structure.
  • Statement of Cash Flows: This is a financial report that exhibits the net amount of cash that goes into or passes out of a company. Generating positive cash flow demonstrates a business’ ability to create value to shareholders.
  • Sources and Uses of Funds: This financial report is especially important to investors. Sources and uses of funds exhibit where all the funds a business can raise comes from, and how these funds will be used in the business. The total sources of funds must always match the total uses of funds.

There are also several Pro Forma features. This is the most crucial features of each component that potential buyers and investors look at are:

  • Gross Margins: Gross Margins are the total sales revenue of a business, minus its cost of goods (COGS) sold, which is then divided by the total sales revenue. Gross Margins are expressed as a percentage. The higher the percentage of a company’s gross margins, the more the company is making on each good sold.
  • EBITDA: Earnings Before Interest, Tax, Depreciation, and Amortization (EBIDTA) is a measure of a company’s performance, which is done by taking the company’s non-cash expenses of depreciation and amortization and adding it onto a company’s operating income.
  • Growth Rates: Growth Rates are used to assess a company’s growth and make future assumptions of the company’s performance in terms of revenue and production. Growth rates can be used to assess a company’s profitability and can also be applied to other relevant metrics to make other determinations and assumptions that affect a company’s performance.
  • Payback Periods: Payback Periods give insight into how long it will take an investor to recoup his or her investment. The shorter the payback period, the more attractive the investment is.
  • Returns on Investments: Returns on Investments or ROIs measures the gains or losses on an investment based on the amount of money that was invested. Typically, this performance measure is used to evaluate the efficiency of an investment or compare the efficiency against several other investments.

These pro forma components and features are important to business owners, investors, and potential buyers for several reasons. First, this information can be used to leverage investment pitches and strengthen business plans that are presented to potential investors. Second, it can be used to develop an operating budget to ensure that a business does not run out of money before it becomes profitable. And third, it can be used to value a business or a company that could be sold or acquired. So, what should you take into consideration while raising capital? A company or a business raising capital should take four things into consideration:

  1. Clearly define your business plan. This includes having a strong financial report (Pro Forma) that demonstrates how much your company will need to start up, how the funds will be used, how long it will take for the company to become profitable, and its growth rate to show how much value an investor is looking at if he or she decides to invest in your company/business.
  1. Clearly define in the business plan how the money/funds will be used. Being able to clearly demonstrate where sources of funds are coming from, and where these funds will be used will provide a better sense of security to any investor.
  1. Make sure that you raise enough money, including enough for a contingency fund. The worst thing that can happen is having a business run out of funding before it becomes profitable.
  1. Make sure you know your numbers and that they work. Ensuring that the underlying assumptions that are used in your company’s financial reports & models are accurate and well-supported can provide more reliability and industry expertise that investors look at when deciding to invest.

Pro formas can provide significant insight into how much capital or funding a company needs to raise. The pro forma would provide a snapshot into Capital Expenditures and Working Cash Flow that outlines a company’s expenses and the required capital to cover those expenses. When pitching to potential investors, a company’s pro forma will be able to demonstrate how investor’s money will be used. It will also be able to indicate how much cash the business/company will be able to generate with appropriate funding.

Stay in-the-know

Sign up to receive updates on our latest publications

How can we help your
cannabis business grow?