A federal defense bill will move forward without a provision that would’ve let banks offer services to the $17.5B cannabis industry. But Congressional backers remain supportive and fintechs have found workarounds.

Brazil-based credit startup Open Co, India’s BNPL card fintech Uni, and cannabis card provider SuperNet are all meeting unmet payment needs.

Healthcare and pharma ad spending remains the smallest ad-spending category in the US due to restrictive compliance laws that make it difficult to target audiences, but the legalization of cannabis has helped bolster spending.

Tagger analyzed roughly 11.6 million Instagram posts from 161,000 US influencers from January 1–July 30, 2020, in the following categories: travel, beauty, cannabis, DIY, food and drink, family, fashion and style, lifestyle, sports and fitness, and media and publications. Engagement was defined as any type of interaction with influencer content, including likes, shares, comments and views.