Could Marijuana Be The Big Winner In Tuesday’s Vote?

Next Tuesday – election day – voters in five state will say yes or no to legalizing marijuana, either for medical or recreational purposes, or both. Those votes could go a long way toward reshaping the federal approach to weed.

Which means, those votes could go a long way toward propelling share prices for a broad collection of marijuana-related companies.

The states in play are New Jersey, Arizona, Mississippi, South Dakota, and Montana. Local polling indicates that a “yes” vote will likely carry the day in the first four states. Montana is tighter, and will likely come down to undecided voters.

At the moment, 34 states have legalized marijuana in some fashion. Another four or five would indicate that more than 75% of the states now view weed as little different than alcohol and tobacco – a vice to be regulated and off which state governments can extract millions of dollars in annual taxes.

That’s the point at which change is likely to happen at the federal level, and that will have investment implications. [Read more at Forbes]