News

June 25, 2009

Cranswick Brings Home The Bacon

By Sally White

An old cliché it may be, but Cranswick does not mind the one about sows’ ears and silk purses at all. The pig meat producer is having an excellent year – it won the 2009 Meat Manufacturer award; renegotiated its bank facilities; its latest figures showed a 17 per cent rise in sales and eight per cent for profits despite recession; and it has just pulled off the £17.5 million purchase from its own resources of pork producer Bowes of Norfolk.All of that shot the share price up to 850p in March and got Cranswick into the FTSE 250 index.

Since then, however,  then the shares have been seeing more than a bit of profit-taking. The market was not sure that it liked the idea of Cranswick blowing the £17 million it received from the sale of its pet food business on an acquisition. While borrowings of £66.6 million and gearing of 40 per cent are not exacting, in these hard times the more cash in the bank the better. So the shares have been knocked back to 584p. That leaves at a discount to its food manufacturing peers that does...