Schultze Special Purpose Acquisition Corp. Shareholders Approve Clever Leaves Deal

Schultze Special Purpose Acquisition Corporation (NASDAQ:SAMA) announced in an 8-K filing that its shareholders approved its combination with cannabis product-maker Clever Leaves at a special meeting earlier today.

The transaction was nearly unanimously approved, but, even more importantly, just 5,253 shares were redeemed in connection with the vote. With an estimated $10.22 pro rata in trust, this is expected to remove just $53,685. This is a very good result for a SPAC that needed to re-strike its deal last month.

This revised the price tag downward and rolled over more of the seller’s equity. It also tacked on a $10 million PIPE and convinced $6 million worth of public investors not to redeem.

The revisions also dropped the minimum cash requirement for the deal from $60 million to $26 million in case Schultze got hit with high redemptions as befell a string of SPACs that month. However, investors in the cannabis sector recently embraced the announced Aphria-Tilray mega merger so Schultze appeared to have some wind at its back.

Schultze initially announced its deal with Clever Leaves July 27. Clever Leaves has a large-scale cannabis cultivation operation in Colombia where it produces pharmaceutical-grade products for sale in Canada and Europe.

The nature of the company’s business and international holdings may add some extra paperwork before the deal can close. But Schultze expects to complete the transaction soon, after which the combined entity’s shares and warrants will trade on the Nasdaq under the symbols “CLVR” and “CLVRW,” respectively.  The Schultze / Clever Leaves combination represents the first SPAC transaction to close with a cannabis producer.

For a full list of measures on the ballot as well as vote tallies, click HERE.