Peter Thiel’s Medicinal Weed Company Tilray Now Worth More Than Expedia, American Airlines

You can’t blame Peter Thiel if he enjoys a celebratory smoke tonight, after Tilray, the Canadian medical marijuana company in which he’s heavily invested, rocketed up 38 percent on Wall Street on Wednesday.

After its major NASDAQ run, Tilray is worth a shade less than $20 billion. That makes it worth more than a slew of big-time companies, including: Expedia, American Airlines, Snap Inc. and Discovery, just to name a few.

It was also worth more than Twitter at one point on Wednesday, but the volatile stock dropped from a high of $300 a share to “only” $214 by the closing bell.

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The big day meant big money for Privateer Holdings Co. — which owns upwards of 75 percent of Tilray’s shares — and Thiel, whose Founders Fund has previously invested in Seattle-based Privateer.

Tilray’s wild day was spurred by the company saying it had received the green light from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration on Tuesday to import medical marijuana for a clinical trial.

The legal weed market has replaced the cryptocurrency boom as the investing fad of 2018. Tilray, after going public in July, has seen its value increase nearly 10 times in two months.

Tilray’s wild two months (via Google)

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Thiel made a fortune as an early Facebook investor in the mid-200s, and his Founders Fund has invested in several companies, including Lyft and Airbnb.

A rep for Thiel did not immediately respond to TheWrap’s request for comment on Tilray’s rapid climb.