The deal announced Monday is the latest in a wave of mergers in the industry as marijuana producers — emboldened by pot legalizations in Europe and a number of U.S. states — seek to cut costs and gain scale.

Canada’s relaxed regulations, a mature industry and free-flowing capital have offered firms a unique opportunity to advance research without the legal and political risks that bog down growers in the U.S. and elsewhere.

Canadian regulators have granted over 70 firms licenses to produce and sell medical marijuana, with more than half granted in 2017 or 2018.

Vancouver-based Aurora and Markham, Ont.-based MedReleaf together expect to produce over 570,000 kg per year of cannabis through nine facilities in Canada and two in Denmark.

MedReLeaf’s assets include a 55,000-square foot indoor facility at Markham, just north of Toronto, with annual production capacity for 7,000 kg; a 210,000 sq. ft. indoor site at Bradford, about 40 km north of Markham, with 28,000 kg per year capacity; and a one million-square foot, 105,000 kg/year greenhouse at Exeter, about 50 km north of London, Ont., growing cannabis for extracts.

“The combination strengthens our capacity to service the rapidly expanding global medical cannabis markets, and amplifies our early-mover advantage,” Aurora CEO Terry Booth said in a statement.

Canada is one of the few countries that exports marijuana, allowing growers to take immediate advantage of recent medical pot legalizations in more than 20 countries. The worldwide legal marijuana market is expected to generate revenue worth $146.4 billion by end of 2025, according to California-based market consultancy by Grand View Research.

“(Aurora is) targeting mostly Europe for exports … the demand is firmly in place, in terms of their medical market,” said Alan Brochstein, founder of cannabis-industry information provider 420 Investor.

“(Europe has) perhaps a better program initially in terms of insurance coverage and distribution through pharmacies,” he added.

The acquisition is Aurora’s second large deal this year, coming just months after it bought CanniMed Therapeutics of Saskatoon for $1.1 billion.

Aurora shareholders will own about 61 per cent of the combined company, following the all-stock deal. Aurora offered to buy each MedReleaf share for $29.44, representing an 18.2 per cent premium to MedReleaf’s Friday closing price.

Aurora would likely sign more deals, but not any as big as the MedReleaf acquisition, Booth said at a media conference in Toronto. The company would also consider listing its shares in New York, he added.

“Aurora has … been pretty aggressive with their expansion plans but now shareholders will want to see those assets being put to use before the company rushes out and buys something else,” said Bruce Campbell, chief investment officer at Cannabis Growth Opportunity Corp.

— Reporting for Reuters by John Benny and Yashaswini Swamynathan in Bangalore and Nichola Saminather in Toronto.

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“The board believes the company needs a leader who will energize the team, realize CN’s corporate vision and take the company forward,” chairman Robert Pace said in a statement.

Once considered the standard for railway efficiency, CN has struggled recently with capacity constraints that have crimped its ability to meet the strong demand to transport crude-by-rail to U.S. Gulf Coast refiners.

Jobin’s departure comes less than a month after Halliburton, the third-largest U.S. oilfield services company, blamed CN for delays in frack sand supply.

Canada’s grain sector has also complained of significant delays, with farmer groups last week pressing for federal legislation allowing penalties on railways for subpar service.

The Ag Transport Coalition, a Prairie grain shippers’ group, on Friday reported grain week 30 as “the poorest order fulfillment performance to date” during 2017-18, with CN supplying just 17 per cent of cars ordered.

CN, Canada’s largest railroad, on Monday appointed chief marketing officer Jean-Jacques Ruest as interim CEO. Ruest has been with the company for 22 years, and the board said he is well known to customers and investors.

Cowen and Co. analysts said despite picking a veteran like Ruest, the surprise announcement along with CN’s existing operational issues would keep “near-term” pressure on its shares.

While the company’s shares have risen nearly 30 per cent since Jobin took the helm in July 2016, they are down 6.4 per cent this year. That compares with a 1.7 percent fall in smaller rival Canadian Pacific Railway’s shares.

CN, which has missed profit expectations in the past two quarters, reaffirmed its full-year 2018 adjusted profit and spending targets.

— Reporting for Reuters by John Benny in Bangalore; includes files from AGCanada.com Network staff.

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PotashCorp, the world’s biggest fertilizer producer, forecast a less profitable year on Thursday than analysts expected, and reported a surprisingly big drop in quarterly profit.

Potash prices are hovering around their lowest levels since 2007, amid bloated capacity and weakening farm incomes, spurring consolidation. Adding to miners’ problems, several new low-cost mines are scheduled to begin production in coming years.

Oversupplied conditions may improve between 2020 and 2022, said Agrium CEO Chuck Magro, speaking at an investor conference in Whistler, B.C. on Wednesday.

Calgary-based Agrium and Saskatoon-based PotashCorp plan to merge by mid-2017 to cut costs and better compete.

“The markets are very, very competitive right now and (the merger) is the only way that we can compete,” Magro said.

Germany’s K+S AG will ramp up production at its new Saskatchewan mine this year, while EuroChem begins mining potash in Russia next year.

“We remain concerned these so-called ‘trough’ earnings levels could linger for years,” said BMO analyst Joel Jackson, in a note.

Earlier Thursday, PotashCorp reported fourth-quarter results which included a 22 per cent slide in sales. Its U.S.-listed shares were down 2.7 per cent at $19.33 in midmorning, and its outlook also dragged down competitors Agrium and Mosaic Co.

PotashCorp said it expected earnings of 35 to 55 cents per share in 2017, including costs related to its pending merger of five cents per share. The forecast fell well short of analysts’ average expectation of 62 cents a share, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

The midpoint of PotashCorp’s 2017 forecast, 45 cents, would be its second-lowest annual profit in 13 years.

Even so, potash prices are weak enough to stimulate strong demand, and are creeping higher.

PotashCorp expects potash sales to rise in 2017 to between 8.7 million and 9.4 million tonnes, from 8.6 million in 2016.

“We continue to proactively position the company for opportunity and resiliency in any market conditions,” Potash CEO Jochen Tilk said in a statement. The company plans to curtail western Canadian production this year.

PotashCorp’s fourth-quarter net earnings plunged to $59 million, or seven cents per share, from $201 million or 24 cents per share a year earlier.

— Reporting for Reuters by Rod Nickel in Winnipeg and John Benny in Bangalore.

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