For the week ended Friday, August 21, the spot price index for a pound of cannabis spiked more than $200 from $1,709 in the prior week to $1,924. The futures price for December 2015 remained unchanged at $1,385.

About two-thirds of the past week’s transactions occurred in a range of $1,681 to $2,387 per pound, and transaction prices ranged from an average low of $1,300 to a high of $3,200, according to the analysts at Cannabis Benchmarks. The volume-weighted average price in Colorado jumped by 10% from $1,616 on August 14 to $1,784 a pound last week.

The volume-weighted average price in California last week was $1,819 per pound, up nearly 8% from $1,687 in the previous week. San Diego’s first legal dispensary for medical marijuana opened inside the city limits last Saturday, and another is scheduled to open its doors in October.

In Colorado, recreational marijuana sales topped $50 million for the first time in the month of June, totaling $50.1 million. Medical marijuana sales in the state reached $35.2 million, the highest total so far in 2015. The state is also running into a problem that California also contends with: unlicensed cannabis growers are reported to be taking irrigation water illegally. Cannabis Benchmarks notes:

[T]hese reports testify to the continuing expansion of illegal cultivation activities to meet the ever-growing demand illustrated by June’s record sales figures, which do not even capture the state’s still-thriving black market or unregulated product that is being diverted outside the state.

The cannabis market is entering an annual period of supply shortage while waiting for this year’s harvest to begin. Not only are prices rising, but lower quality cannabis will be liquidated over the next month or so. Market participants believe that wholesale prices are at or near seasonal peaks right now.

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Our price check at PriceOfWeed.com shows, with one exception, only moderate changes over the past week. The average price for an ounce of high-quality marijuana in Colorado is currently $241.18, down six cents from August 14. In California, the price of high-quality marijuana is listed at $242.27 (up two cents), compared with $297.13 (up seven cents) in Florida, $317.56 (up six cents) in Georgia, $326.07 (down eight cents) in Texas and $232.06 (up $1.03) in Washington.

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