Heineken keeps top spot, but beer consumption down

THE volume of beer sold in western Europe fell by 2.5 per cent last year as the economic downturn hit consumption.

The Heineken brand held on to its top spot for the 22nd year, selling more than 11 million hectolitres in 2009, while Carlsberg with nearly 8m hectolitres leapfrogged Molson Coors' Carling beer into second place, according to the report by research group Plato Logic.

Two of Heineken's other brands, Foster's and Amstel, filled fourth and fifth spots, while Carlsberg's Kronenbourg came sixth and InBev's Stella Artois was seventh.

Meanwhile, analysts yesterday predicted that the world's second largest brewer, London-based SABMiller, will regain its premium valuation after shares fell last week.

The company's value was marked down after it expressed caution about the speed of economic recovery but analysts believe faster growth in emerging markets will benefit the group.

Bernstein Research analyst Trevor Stirling said: "Its exposure to faster-growing markets is the driver for our expected long-term growth outperformance versus peers, albeit at the price of great short-term currency- related volatility."

Stirling added that SABMiller's diversified exposure to high-growth emerging markets would drive earnings growth of about 16.7 per cent a year over the next five years, well ahead of its rivals, and argued its shares were undervalued.