The main high from Canada’s cannabis legalisation is financial

A BLACK dragon with white claws, its wings etched with Escher-like designs, has a vitrine of its own at the centre of the Boroheads glass gallery in Toronto. The “dab rig” (for smoking cannabis oil) sells for C$8,000 ($6,170). Such items are in high demand, according to the gallery’s co-owner, who calls himself James Bongd. He says “there’s a lot of speculative buying” of cannabis-related paraphernalia, especially of pieces by famous artists like Cap’n Crunk, the dragon’s creator.

Such speculation is the main sign that Canada is about to become the first large country to legalise cannabis for recreational use nationwide, on October 17th. It will then become legal to consume fresh or dried cannabis and cannabis oil, and to grow at home up to four plants. (Uruguay passed a law to legalise cannabis in 2013.) Investors are bidding up the share prices of cannabis-connected companies. In the past two months shares in Tilray, which grows medical marijuana, have risen in value from C$25 to nearly C$130, bringing its stockmarket capitalisation to C$12bn.