Origo Acquisition Corp. and High Times Doing a Concurrent Reg A+ Capital Raise?

Either I’ve got a contact high or the NY Post just let out some interesting information.

High times, indeed. According to a NY Post article that was posted late last night, Origo Acquisition Corporation’s target, High Times, began a Reg A+ funding round this week, exactly one week after shareholders approved the new completion extension date of September 12th.  According to High Times, they hope to raise $20 million via the Reg A+ round.

The article quotes High Times’ Chairman, Adam Levin as saying, “It’s a new path to an IPO,” said Levin. “We raised just over $1 million on Day One from 400 people.” He said High Times Holdings priced at $11 a share.”

Admittedly, I do not have any experience with Reg A+ vehicles, but this raises all sorts of questions.  This was not in the proxy statement, but it’s also unclear to me if it needed to be. However, I would think this would be material information.

Secondly, Origo’s cash in trust is currently $15 million.  If High Times is raising capital via a Reg A+ vehicle to the tune of $20 million, does this mean the merger is off, or is this a concurrent raise?  Can you even do a concurrent raise without completely delaying the merger even further?

Having said that, if High Times already has 400 investors in the Reg A+ deal, that would certainly help solve one of the issues of Origo keeping a Nasdaq listing – needing 450 round lot shareholders.  This is assuming the merger is still on because the article’s title is “High Times Plots New Path to IPO”.  Emphasis on “New Path,“ so it kind of sounds like it’s off?

If anyone has any experience with Reg A+ funding and can help sort this out, please either leave a comment below this article or email me directly.

You can read the article here.