Premium wines fuel Peller’s profits

Article Excerpt

ANDREW PELLER LTD. $15 (Toronto symbol ADW.A; Income Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 14.3 million; Market cap: $214.5 million; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.7; Dividend yield: 2.8%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.andrewpeller.com) is Canada’s second-largest producer of wines, after Vincor International. Its wineries in Nova Scotia, Ontario and British Columbia account for 13.4% of the Canadian wine market. In the second quarter of its 2015 fiscal year, which ended September 30, 2014, Peller’s sales rose 7.2%, to $82.8 million from $77.2 million a year earlier. That’s mainly because the company started selling its Wayne Gretzky wines in Western Canada. It also launched several new products, including its skinnygrape spritzers and Panama Jack cocktails. Earnings jumped 45.5%, to $5.1 million, or $0.37 a share, from $3.5 million, or $0.25. Without unusual items, such as losses on hedging contracts the company uses to lock in foreign exchange rates and costs related to the restructuring of its home-winemaking division, earnings gained 5.2%. The lower operating costs resulting from the…