Evergreen Annuity & Life Aims to Serve Cannabis Growers
Today, cannabis firms often have trouble finding life insurers that will take their payments.
Evergreen Annuity & Life hopes to begin selling annuities and life insurance to cannabis company owners sometime next year.
The Ann Arbor, Michigan-based company is preparing to apply for permission from Michigan regulators to operate as a life insurer there.
Evergreen believes other states’ reciprocity agreements with Michigan will help it extend its footprint to six to 14 other states, according to a fact sheet the company has prepared for its investors.
If all goes as planned, the company could generate more than $250 million in new annualized premiums from life and annuity sales in 2022.
State Law v. Federal Law
Anthony Cloutier, one of the company’s three co-founders, said in an email interview that cannabis growers need a life insurer of their own because of a conflict between state and federal law on growers’ ability to use traditional financial services companies.
Some states, including Colorado, have passed laws authorizing the sale of marijuana for medical purposes, for recreational purposes or for all purposes.
The federal government still outlaws the sale of marijuana and classifies proceeds from the sale of marijuana as proceeds from the sale of unlawful activity. Life insurers have responded to the federal government’s views by declining to accept cannabis industry revenue as an acceptable source of funds for paying product premiums, Cloutier said.
Cloutier said that he and the other Evergreen co-founders believe they have come up with a way to use the fact that insurance is state-regulated to overcome that obstacle.
“All the states we’ve spoken to have been supportive and helpful,” Cloutier said. “Ultimately we all want the same thing: insurance services available to their residents from a competitive and competent company.”
The Founders
Cloutier is a former Goldman Sachs analyst who has been running a field marketing organization in New Hampshire, The Cloutier Group’s Estate & Financial Strategies, since 2007.
Mac Chrystal, another founder, has been working in financial services product distribution since 2011. He has been president of Gen3 Advisor Group, an Ohio-based independent marketing organization, since 2014.
The third founder, Jasnik Parmar, has been involved with investment advisory firms since 2012.
Pictured: Anthony Cloutier (Photo: Evergreen Annuity & Life)