Geoffrey Lawrence

Research Director, Reason Foundation

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Geoffrey Lawrence is research director at Reason Foundation.

Lawrence has been a financial executive in both the public and private sectors and has served as chief financial officer of publicly traded, growth stage, and startup manufacturing and distribution companies. He was CFO of Players Network, the first fully reporting, publicly traded marijuana licensee to be listed on a U.S. exchange, CFO of C Quadrant, a startup manufacturer and distributor that was subsequently sold to Lowell Farms (LOWL), CFO of Apex Extractions, a manufacturer and distributor based in Oakland that he helped take public, and, most recently, CFO of Claybourne Co., a top-3 flower brand in California by market share. Through these roles, Lawrence raised capital, planned capital expenditure, prepared financial forecasts, implemented systems for accounting and inventory control, designed internal control processes, managed monthly and quarterly closings and reporting, managed compliance with state and local regulations, negotiated contracts, and prepared filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Lawrence also served as a senior appointee to the Nevada Controller’s Office, where he oversaw the state’s external financial reporting. Prior to joining Reason Foundation in 2018, Lawrence had also spent a decade as a policy analyst on labor, fiscal, and energy issues between North Carolina’s John Locke Foundation and the Nevada Policy Research Institute.

Lawrence is additionally the founder and president of an accounting and advisory firm with particular expertise in the licensed cannabis industry and public markets.

Lawrence holds an M.S. and B.S. in accounting from Western Governors University, an M.A. in international economics from American University, and a B.A. in international relations from the University of North Carolina at Pembroke. He lives in Las Vegas with his wife and two children and enjoys baseball and mixed martial arts.

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