Peller gets an assist from Gretzky

Article Excerpt

ANDREW PELLER LTD. $9.85 (Toronto symbol ADW.A; Income Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 14.3 million; Market cap: $140.9 million; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.5; Dividend yield: 3.7%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.andrewpeller.com) reported that its sales rose 4.7% in the three months ended June 30, 2012, to $72.7 million from $69.4 million a year earlier. The company launched a number of new wines and is seeing rising demand for its high-margin premium brands. A new 10-year deal to make and distribute wines under the Wayne Gretzky brand also contributed to the higher sales. Peller earned $4.7 million, or $0.34 a share, in the quarter. That’s up 19.2% from $3.9 million, or $0.28 a share. If you exclude gains on hedging contracts that the company uses to lock in foreignexchange rates, earnings would have risen 7.0%. Andrew Peller is a buy. buy…