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Virginia passes bill to legalize marijuana

Virginia has become the first southern state to legalize marijuana. Yahoo Finance's Zack Guzman and Akiko Fujita share the details.

Video Transcript

AKIKO FUJITA: Well, Virginia just becoming the first southern state to legalize the recreational use of marijuana, with lawmakers passing Governor Ralph Northam's proposal there. Under the law, adults over 21 can begin using and growing marijuana in July. But Zack, we've still got a delay until the retail sales. That not expected to launch until 2024, which is why maybe we're not seeing a significant move in cannabis stocks today. But this is still a big move. And I wonder how much of this has been prompted by the need for additional revenue.

ZACK GUZMAN: Yeah, I mean, that's one of the questions we've been having in terms of why we expected more states. Of course, we got New Jersey and New York. New York was one of those where we did hear from Governor Cuomo talking about, look, we got states in our region who have legalized. We're going to be losing out on this. Might as well do it. Might as well get some tax revenue. But here, interesting because it seems like more of the social justice piece was more of the driving force as to why Virginia's governor wanted to expedite this. Because it was set to take a couple of years to have this go into effect.

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But he has said he wanted it to happen quicker when you think about all of the Americans-- in this case, Virginians-- who would be prosecuted against for something that seems to be going in the other direction. So that's why he was negotiating with state legislators there to kind of move that up. And now we get the date, July 1, when you'll be allowed to, or at least, people in Virginia, adults there allowed to possess up to one ounce and cultivate at home for plants.

And Akiko, critics might look at this and say, you are going to be giving the black market a head start here if you're not going to set up legal sales. And maybe that's why we're not seeing US cannabis companies really see a bump here off the news. But it's interesting because each time we talk about it, states are going different routes. But increasingly, we are hearing that social justice piece mentioned more and more. And you do think that's going to put pressure on federal legislators, people in Congress, to really press the issue and make some headway. Because those laws remain unchanged as of yet.

AKIKO FUJITA: Yeah, it does seem like we're looking at an increasingly fragmented market. On the one hand, a lot of guests we've had on have said, look, with the states moving so rapidly, that kind of gives a pass to the federal side of things. But at the same time, to your point, when you've got so many different states operating on different laws, I wonder if that maybe creates a little more urgency for the federal conversation to advance more quickly.

ZACK GUZMAN: Yeah, and we've heard from Senator Schumer, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer talking about why they want to do this, why they need to do this. Of course, we're still waiting to hear where President Biden might fall on it. But clearly, as more and more states move ahead, I think that pressure is ramping up a bit here at the federal level. But that will--