Molson Coors Brewing Co. reported a lower-than-expected quarterly profit, hurt by a fall in beer sales in Canada and higher spending on marketing.
The company earlier this year sold the rights to distribute Grupo Modelo's brands in Canada to Anheuser-Busch InBev. Anheuser-Busch acquired Mexico's Grupo in 2012.
Molson Coors reported a net loss attributable to the company of $34.4 million, or 19 cents per share, for the third quarter ended Sept. 30, compared with a net profit of $134.3 million, or 73 cents per share, a year earlier.
Excluding items, profit was $1.46 per share.
Analysts on average had expected earnings of $1.48 per share, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
Net sales at Molson Coors, whose brands include Coors Light and Cobra beer, fell marginally to $1.17 billion and were in line with analysts' average estimate.
Underlying pretax income from Canada fell 8.9 percent to $132.6 million. Pretax income from Canada has risen only once in the last 11 quarters.
Separately, MillerCoors, the U.S. operations of Molson Coors and SABMiller, reported an 8 percent rise in quarterly net profit, helped by strong sales of its highest-priced beer brands.
Molson Coors owns 42 percent and SABMiller the rest of the business, whose "above premium" brands include Leinenkugel's Summer Shandy and Blue Moon Belgian White.