Medical cannabis is cutting edge but hemp pays the bills — in the US at least.

Hemp grower Elixinol Global (ASX:EXL) more than doubled its full year revenue in 2018, and expects to make even more money next year as it goes deep in the US.

It still reported a loss of $860,000, showing that no Aussie pot stocks are fully profitable yet. But that was 68 per cent smaller than the loss it made in 2017.

Elixinol listed just over a year ago with a revenue-generating hemp business based in Colorado, USA.

It has since added outlets in Japan, Europe and New Zealand, an Australian hemp business — that made $4.9m in revenue last year — and a medical cannabis business here too which just bought a 60-acre farm in NSW for $2.6m to build a marijuana growing and manufacturing facility.

The company, which reports on a calendar year basis rather than the June-to-June year favoured by most Australian businesses, made $37m in revenue in 2018, 121 per cent more than in 2017.

The majority of that came from the US, where the business was established in 2014.

The company is looking forward to the opportunities raised by the passing of the US Farm Bill in December, which federally legalised industrial hemp farming and hemp-derived cannabidiol (CBD), one of the cannabinoid compounds in a marijuana plant.

This means Elixinol, and all of its rivals, are allowed to sell products with CBD in them throughout the US. They are, however, restricted from making health claims around them as per Food and Drug Administration (FDA) rules.

“Elixinol launched SATIVA Skin Care to US consumers on 8 December 2018… Post the reporting period, Elixinol has launched, via all regular US channels, a new branded product of water soluble, full spectrum, rapidly dissolving CBD powdered drink mixes,” the company said.

In Australia they launched the SATIVA range, which is marketed as including compounds such as Omega 3 and vitamin E from the hemp oil but not CBD, snack bars and ready-to-eat meals, and hemp burgers.

Elixinol shares rose as high as 7.5 per cent to $3.58, near its all-time high.

Elixinol shares over the last 12 months.

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