source: AFP
The COVID-19 pandemic has obviously had a dramatic effect on businesses in Canada, as far as the impact upon them concerning supply chains, demand, and the decline in availability of retail stores to acquire cannabis in; the number of which were already unable to meet consumer demand.
Aurora Cannabis (NASDAQ:ACB) has been affected along with its Canadian peers, with positives and negatives in regard to its performance in the last and current quarters.
While there are a number of variables to consider, I want to specifically look at two of them that will have an impact on the quarter ended March 31, and also the current quarter; including the unknown effect of the rush to buy cannabis in anticipation of Canada starting to shut things down, and the decision to shutter a number of cannabis retail outlets, including in the important Ontario market.
Stocking up
In March Canadians, realizing there would be limitations on access to cannabis, started to buy up product in bulk in anticipation of a potentially prolonged period of time of limited supply.
Daffyd Roderick, communications director for Ontario Cannabis Store, said in mid-March that weekend revenue from OCS.ca soared from 80 to 100 percent over normal sales; this was before the rush to acquire pot began in earnest, as news surrounding the disruption coming from COVID-19 spread across the nation.
Ontario Cannabis Store is an online government portal for pot sales in the province.
Although there's no way of knowing at this time whether or not Canadian marijuana customers had changed their regular habit of going to physical stores for product or not, it's definitely a big catalyst for the quarter if the same or better results were occurring in retail outlets.
Assuming Aurora got a decent piece of this overall Canadian pie during
