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Paterson was headed out to his car in the parking lot at Alterna’s Toronto office when one of his lieutenants caught up to him and said, “You won’t believe what’s come to us — a weed company.”

Initially, Paterson dismissed the idea. But then, like any good banker, he hit the books. He and his crew spent several months studying Linton’s business plan. They scoured the regulations on medical marijuana and even interviewed doctors. Paterson was impressed. He came back to his team and declared: “Look, why would we not do this business?” The marijuana company with the funky name, Tweed Inc., had found its bank.

That was three years ago. Since then, Paterson has become the go-to banker for the pot industry, and his first cannabis customer, Linton, the no-longer-desperate marijuana executive, is proud to show off his 650,000-square-foot pot facility in Smiths Falls, Ont. — a burg of 8,885 slowly rebounding from the shutdowns of the Hershey and Stanley Works tool plants a decade ago.

“Chocolate Shoppe,” proclaim the golden letters on an interior wall — put there as a tribute to past glory — but Linton’s operation, now demurely christened Canopy Growth Corp., bristles with high-tech equipment; the production area requires a fingerprint scan for access. Inside, rows of lush marijuana plants will be harvested and dried and become fodder for joints and pipes as well as refined into oils for soft-gel capsules to treat chronic pain, nausea from cancer treatment, sleep disorders, and anxiety.