🫠 This Year in Psychedelics

PRESENTED BY ALTHEA 🤝

Welcome to Tricycle Day. We’re the psychedelics newsletter that will be smooching ourselves when the ball drops at midnight. As a wise drag queen once said, “If you can't love yourself, how the hell are you gonna love somebody else?” 😘

Yup, it’s already New Year’s Eve, Cyclists. Insane, we know. To soften the blow of the ever-compressing passage of time, we offer you this palate cleanser: our best memes of 2025.

Better? Great. Now, instead of our usual weekly missive, we’re putting on a bow on 2025 by recapping the year and manifesting our hopes and dreams for 2026.

Let’s dive in.

FROM OUR SPONSORS

As we close the books on another wild year in psychedelics, one thing has become abundantly clear.

The bottleneck isn't research anymore. Nope, not regulation either. It's access.

Healing Hearts Changing Minds is betting 2026 will be the breakout year for psychedelic therapy, not just in labs or luxury clinics, but for the people who need it most.

And they’re proudly putting their thumb on the scale. They’ve funded organizations making ethical, equitable access for veterans and marginalized groups a reality.

2026, let’s do this.

Learn more about their work and vision for the field.

THE PEAK EXPERIENCE

In case you blinked and missed it

2025 was… a lot.

So instead of painstakingly cataloguing every last research study, legislative bill, and business deal, we’re highlighting four key themes that defined the year.

Here goes.

Psychedelic therapy is breaking out

Colorado's natural medicine program officially launched in June. Psilocybin healing centers are now open for business, meaning adults can legally journey with licensed facilitators. Oregon continued refining its model and produced the first batch of real-world outcomes data. (Insurance companies, you paying attention yet?) And New Mexico passed its Medical Psilocybin Act, becoming the third state to legalize therapeutic access, and the first to do so through the legislature.

Psychedelic bills are now pending in more than a dozen states including Maryland, New Jersey, Massachusetts, New York, and Iowa. The patchwork may be messy, but states are done waiting for federal action.

Ibogaine is having a moment

In May, Texas approved $50 million for ibogaine clinical trials, marking the largest publicly-funded psychedelic research initiative in history. Aside from the eye-popping budget, what makes this move special is the public-private partnership, which promises to keep IP rights with taxpayers and affordability top of mind. (It’s still anyone’s guess who the commercial partner will be though.)

At least 15 other states are now exploring similar programs. Texas may have kicked off a nationwide race (or better yet, cooperative effort) to address the opioid crisis for good.

Big Pharma has arrived

Speaking of unfathomable dollar amounts, AbbVie dropped a casual $2 billion on a single molecule from Gilgamesh Pharmaceuticals. Guess Big Pharma isn’t trying to squash psychedelics after all… as long as they can get a piece.

The FDA still likes what it sees, too. Transcend Therapeutics' methylone became the sixth psychedelic drug to earn a breakthrough therapy designation. Then, AtaiBeckley's 5-MeO-DMT nasal spray snagged the seventh, not long after announcing its merger.

As for the frontrunners, Compass Pathways accelerated its launch timeline for psilocybin by 9-12 months, meaning COMP360 could be approved as early as late 2026. And Lykos secured $50 million to keep the MDMA dream alive and rebranded as Resilient Pharmaceuticals. (How fitting.)

Trump’s team is tripping

Love him or hate him, POTUS has surrounded himself with a remarkably psychedelic-friendly crew. Matt Zorn joined HHS as Deputy General Counsel, aka “the psychedelics czar.” RFK Jr. runs HHS, and we all know where he stands. FDA commissioner Marty Makary declared psychedelics a top priority and created a new fast-track voucher system. Surgeon General pick Casey Means has openly shared about her own experiences with psilocybin. And VA Secretary Doug Collins is fighting hard for veteran access.

You might say talk is cheap, and you’d be right, especially when politicians are involved. But to their credit, movement is happening. In August, the DEA forwarded a psilocybin rescheduling petition to HHS. And just this month, Trump ordered cannabis to be moved to Schedule III. Even the VA is expanding psychedelic trials across nine facilities. Hard to deny the political winds are shifting. 🫠

AFTERGLOW

It’s about to get real

Now for the fun part. Knock on wood, but we think 2026 could be a big year for psychedelics.

Here are our five (cautiously optimistic) predictions for the next twelve months.

• 🍄 FDA approves COMP360. Compass's Phase 3 data drops, regulators eat it up, and we get our first FDA-approved classical psychedelic. Hopefully the DEA reschedules all psilocybin to Schedule III, not just Compass's formulation. Either way, doctors will be able to prescribe synthetic psilocybin for treatment-resistant depression.

• 🏥 New Mexico becomes the blueprint. New Mexico launches psilocybin therapy. It’s the first strictly medical model in the US. Other states realize this approach is less risky (and expensive) than a full regulatory framework à la Oregon or Colorado, so they follow suit with their own pilot programs. Also, Colorado rolls out ibogaine.

• 💰 Big Pharma keeps consolidating. We see more M&A deals from drug cos that want exposure to psychedelics (or neuroplastogens/whatever term du jour the kids are using). Psychedelics are established as a legitimate pharmaceutical category, and investors are hungry for their exits. Maybe there’s an acquisition that makes AbbVie's $2 billion bet look modest.

• ⛪ Churches get blessed. After years of litigation, the DEA is forced to provide clear, actionable guidance on religious exemptions for psychedelic sacraments. Churches shift from a gray area to well-trodden access route, alongside FDA-approved drugs and state-regulated programs. Praise the plant spirits.

• 🤯 Tricycle Day surprises you. Okay, this time we’re cheating. But we have big news of our own, and it’s dropping so soon our spine is tingling.

All that said, no one really knows what the future holds. Might as well hold the high vision, right?

Thanks for pedaling with us, Cyclists. Don’t forget to enjoy the ride. 🫠

UNTIL NEXT TIME

That’s all for today, Cyclists! Whenever you’re ready, here’s how we can help.

ONE CYCLIST’S REVIEW

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DISCLAIMER: This newsletter is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional medical advice. The use, possession, and distribution of psychedelic drugs are illegal in most countries and may result in criminal prosecution.