Molson Coors released its Q1 results yesterday

A resurgent Europe helped Molson Coors offset a stuttering North America in the first three months of 2013, an analyst has said, as rival value brands in Canada damaged sales in the period.

Stifel's Mark Swartzberg said in a note today (8 May) that the UK drove Europe to post 4% currency-neutral sales growth in Q1, which should see the brewer out-perform analyst expectations in the continent. Swartzberg said the UK accelerated sales growth last month, while benefits from Molson's StarBev takeover in June last year should boost FY profits by about 1.8 percentage points.

“We take Q1 as a sign that Europe is likely to out-perform our prior estimates,” Swartzberg said.

Swartzberg lowered Molson's profits forecasts in Canada after the region posted a “soft start” to the year because of “continued pressure from competing value brands”, the analyst said. He also put a poor Q1 performance in the US down to bad weather.

Molson Coors yesterday posted a slump in first-quarter profits because of the StarBev acquisition, however the Czech unit helped push sales up by 20%.