From the drinks business: Diageo is selling its entire Argentine wine business including its Navarro Correas and San Telmo brands to Gupo Peñaflor, continuing its strategy to offload its wine arm.
I am not surprised. To the extent that Diageo was profiting from its AR operations, it has been extremely difficult to have the profits leave the country (recently increasingly so). I had no idea that they owned the fine San Telmo brand. I’ve been in plenty an establishment where I’ve seen a customer sit down with a bottle of a fine San Telmo white along with a wine glass and a mini ice bucket and tongs on the side, all the better to enhance the wine temperature (and numb the flavor). Recognizing the tax loss now was probably a better bet than waiting to see the Argentine election’s outcome. [This comment isn’t political in the sense of discussing Argentine politics, just discussed to explain a possible rationale for the business decision.]
No worries – it makes sense, and all the more so as Grupo Peñaflor is Argentine and has no need to pull profits out of the country. And since Diageo is pretty much offing ALL its wine brands . . . .