05 June

TERMÓMETRO ECONÓMICO (EL ECONOMISTA 7)GRUMA. The largest corn flour producer in the world showed a positive trend last week, which raised the price of its stock 1.02%. It closed Friday June 2 at 244.89 pesos.

08 June

RANKING OF THE 500 MOST IMPORTANT MEXICAN COMPANIES /MABE-GRUMA NOBODY TELLS THEM WHERE THE BORDER IS (EXPANSIÓN 108-128-132) In theRanking of the 500 most important Mexican companies,Gruma holds position number 48.Gruma, the company that is already in the highest positions in Mexico and United States wants to grow in other regions with new products…Gruma is executing a 550-million dollar investment plan, between 2016 and 2017, intending to bolster its positions in the markets where it is present. The company is using these resources to build a plant in Dallas, Texas, while it builds a new one in Russia, expands the capacity of another plant in Italy, and starts up operations of yet another plant in Malaysia to supply the Asian market. “When the time comes we will study opportunities in other markets, but for now we do not intend to surrender any one the markets we have worked so hard to develop,” stated Raúl Cavazos, Gruma Corporate Finance and Planning Director.Mexico only contributes 27% of the firm’s total income, even though it accounts for more than half of its sales in volume.  By contrast, 53% of its revenue comes from United States, 7% from Europe and another 7% from Central America…

“Expectations center around United States and Europe. In United States the company is well established, but there are parts of Europe where it is not as well-known as in America, and therefore requires larger advertising investments. There are more players there, but possibilities for the next two or three years are great,” says José Antonio Cebeira, a Casa de Bolsa Actinver analyst…

Corn flour sales in Mexico continue to be the company’s most solid market, but it considers there is still ample margin to grow and switch the states in central and northern Mexico to flour. “Of the 100% of tortillas consumed in Mexico, only 35% are made with corn flour, while the remaining 65 to 70% are made with nixtamal. We have room to continue growing,” notes Cavazos...

LISTING OF THE MOST IMPORTANT COMPANIES IN MEXICO (EXPANSIÓN 217-227) Expansión magazine ranksGruma48th in the list of Mexico’s 500 most important companies.Grupo Industrial Maseca is in position 165.

HONOR ROLL (EXPANSIÓN 259-266) Companies in the Honor Roll for outstanding performance in their main financial indicators includeGruma among the most profitable companies.

MEXICAN RESTAURANTS OUTNUMBER PIZZERIAS IN THE US. (EL FINANCIERO 14) In the first four months of the year the number of Mexican restaurants (including smalltaquerías and fast food chains), surpassed the number of pizzerias, making Mexican the second most popular kind of food in the country, according to US food consulting firm CHD Experts. Increased Mexican food consumption in United States strengthenedGruma and Minsa sales in our neighboring country. Between 2013 and 2016, the contribution of the US market in consolidated Minsa revenue went from 17 to 27 percent, whereas forGruma, this ratio went from 50 to 56 percent of total sales between 2014 and 2016. At the end of the first quarter of 2017,Gruma reported a 2 percent increase in net sales in the US, vs. the same period in 2016. Minsa, however does not detail its operations by countries in its quarterly reports, only in annual reports.

10 June

THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING... #ESCRIBETUMARCA. (IMEF 3-50-57) IMEF magazine  publishes a list of the Most Valuable Latin America Brands 2017 (Kantar Millward Brown), whereMasecaranks 13 valued at 1,051 million dollars.

13 June

TABLERO/WEALTH AND POWER INDEX (FORBES MÉXICO 20)Juan Antonio González Moreno (Gruma), 105,041 millions of pesos. Some analysts expect 2017 figures will exceed company budgets showing larger margins, and consider that any lower results will derive from profit withdrawals, more than from pressure to stock prices, currently at 140.0 pesos.