Operator
Operator
Welcome to the Constellation Brands Third Quarter 2018 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions]. I will now turn the call over to Patty Yahn-Urlaub, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
Constellation Brands, Inc. (STZ)
Q3 2018 Earnings Call· Fri, Jan 5, 2018
$151.47
-2.53%
Same-Day
-1.38%
1 Week
-1.07%
1 Month
-2.61%
vs S&P
-0.50%
Operator
Operator
Welcome to the Constellation Brands Third Quarter 2018 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions]. I will now turn the call over to Patty Yahn-Urlaub, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
Patty Yahn-Urlaub
Analyst
Thank you, Lori. Good morning, and welcome to our third quarter fiscal 2018 conference call. I'm here this morning with Rob Sands, our President and Chief Executive Officer; and David Klein, our Chief Financial Officer. As a reminder, reconciliations between the most directly comparable GAAP measure and any non-GAAP financial measures discussed on this call are included in our news release or otherwise available on the company's website at www.cbrands.com. Please refer to the news release and Constellation's SEC filings for risk factors which may impact forward-looking statements we make on this call. Before turning the call over to Rob, similar to prior quarters I’d like to ask that we limit everyone to one question per person which will have us end our call on schedule. Thanks in advance. And now here's Rob.
Robert Sands
Analyst
Thank you, Patty, and good morning, and Happy New Year. I hope you enjoyed the holidays and had the opportunity to include some of our fine Constellation products in your celebrations with family and friends. As I reflect on 2017, I am reminded that it has been a dynamic time for our business. We posted another year of exceptional stock price performance, with Constellation stock increasing almost 50% for the calendar year 2017 versus the S&P 500, which grew about 20% for the year. Overall, stars, Constellation was one of the best performers among the S&P 500 Consumer Staples stocks. I believe our excellent stock price performance continues to be driven by our strong financial results and the ongoing growth prospects for our business. The confidence in our future business prospects compelled us to seek board authorization for a new multiyear $3 billion share repurchase program subsequent to the recent repurchases of more than 200 million of our outstanding shares. I'm also excited about our recent investment in Canopy Growth Corporation, the largest publicly traded cannabis supplier in the world and a leader in the medical cannabis market in Canada. Founded in 2014 and based in Ontario, Canopy Growth is one of the earliest commercial players in Canada's legal cannabis market and has a global presence via numerous joint ventures and partnerships. Canopy is traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange and currently has a market cap in the $5 billion range. This investment provides Constellation with a first-mover advantage for a potentially significant emerging consumer opportunity and aligns with our long-term strategy to identify, meet and stay ahead of evolving consumer trends and market dynamics while maintaining focus on our core total beverage alcohol business. Our plan is to jointly collaborate with Canopy in a number of areas. Initially, we…
David Klein
Analyst
Thanks, Rob, and good morning, everyone. I'm pleased to be here with you today to discuss another quarter of strong execution. On a year-to-date basis, we've grown market share, expanded margins and improved our capital structure while investing in growth initiatives that will benefit us as we go forward. Our fiscal '18 year-to-date comparable basis diluted EPS is up 29% versus last year. Q3 comparable basis diluted EPS increased 2%. The low Q3 EPS growth rate was primarily due to timing as we're increasing our full year comparable basis diluted EPS guidance to a range of $8.40 to $8.50 from $8.25 to $8.40. This improvement is primarily due to anticipated favorability in our full year tax rate and better margin performance in our beer business, which I'll talk about in a moment. We now expect our fiscal '18 comparable effective tax rate to approximate 20% versus our previous 21% guidance. Our EPS and tax rate guidance excludes any impacts from recently enacted tax reform. Before I move further into our results, let me provide some comments on the new tax legislation. First of all, we're pleased with the bill that was enacted and want to thank our friends in Congress for their work to reform the corporate tax code. Like most companies, we're in the process of evaluating the specific impacts of tax reform, but it is clearly favorable to our previous low to mid-20s long-term effective tax rate guidance. For fiscal '18, we expect to benefit in our U.S. federal statutory tax rate. The new 21% corporate tax rate will apply for the last two months of our fiscal year, resulting in a lower blended statutory tax rate versus the historical 35% rate. We expect the new tax legislation, including the impact of the tax rate deduction -- or…
Operator
Operator
[Operator Instructions]. Your first question comes from the line of Dara Mohsenian of Morgan Stanley.
Dara Mohsenian
Analyst
My question is on the beer division. First, David, you mentioned a number of reasons behind the expected large year-over-year decline in beer operating margins in Q4. Are those more discrete factors in Q4 causing the year-over-year compression? Are you comfortable those factors don't linger and you get back to expansion beyond Q4? And then also on the top line front in beer, can you help frame the magnitude of contribution you expect from Premier next fiscal year based on what you're seeing in test markets so far and in light of the heavy investment of more than $35 million that you mentioned earlier in the call?
David Klein
Analyst
Yes. Dara, so in terms of Q4 margins for beer, the real issue for us is that we haven't seen a full seasonality picture of our business really until this year because of being under the interim supply agreement prior to this. And so in Q4, it's our lowest net sales quarter of the year, so we get a bit of a delevering effect at the fixed cost line in the plant as well as on the SG&A line. And then on top of that, we're bringing in employees. So we're adding headcount in Q4 that we will be able to deploy when we get into the peak production season, and we have some line commissioning cost. So I think there's just a bit of a seasonality built in, but we're pretty confident in the margins and being able to deliver strong margins going forward. I'd also say, Dara, that we had concerns both for Q3 and Q4 about some headwinds from FX within our beer margins, but with the peso sitting around 19, we're just not seeing those headwinds this year. And then from a top line perspective, we expect the majority of the benefit from the Premier launch will be seen in Q1 of next year versus Q4 of this year, and so we simply expect to have our distributor inventory kind of at our normal 30-ish days at the end of the quarter when we get to the end of the fiscal year, which is why we expect our net sales to be in that 9% to 11% range for the year.
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Nik Modi of RBC Capital Markets.
Sunil Modi
Analyst
Just as we kind of approach the February shelf set -- resets and obviously you're launching some new products into the marketplace, I'm just curious on what the retailers and distributors are saying in terms of incremental space because I know that's been a big initiative that you guys have been pushing for a number of years now. Can you just provide some context on kind of how it looks now and how it's changed from where you were a year ago?
Robert Sands
Analyst
Yes. So I think that in general, we're making good progress on our efforts to increase our space commensurate with how we're growing at retail and our contribution from a profitability point of view at retail. So we continue to see good distribution growth. And so I'd say, everything is on track. We've also made some significant organizational additions to bolster our category management activities and have brought in some really great people to continue to drive those efforts. So in general, we're pleased with the progress that we're making. But we start from a position, as I've stated a number of times, of not being where we think we should be or would like to be from a space allocation point of view at retail.
David Klein
Analyst
Nik, I'd also add that on a year-to-date basis, our effective points of distribution are up double digits, so we continue to do really well in gaining distribution.
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Vivien Azer of Cowen.
Vivien Azer
Analyst
So I was hoping to get your thoughts on the outlook for the beer category. The results from a category perspective despite your very good depletion growth continue to look increasingly sluggish in Nielsen. That's also mirrored in the deceleration we're seeing in PCE growth. And so with your largest market, California, transitioning to legal cannabis, how are you thinking about the overall beer category for calendar '18 and any impact from cannabis?
Robert Sands
Analyst
Yes. So number one, I think that we think that the beer category is fundamentally going to continue to perform as the beer category in general has been performing. It's a flat to slightly down volumetrically market with all of the growth in the market being in the high end and then the premium end, in particular, giving up shares. So I don't think we'd see anything different there as we move into calendar year 2018 or our next fiscal. And then on cannabis in California, we don't really expect to see any impact from that. I think that one of the things that people don't necessarily appreciate is that cannabis has been generally available as medical marijuana and pretty accessible to almost everybody for 16 years. And therefore, the, I'd say, official legalization on a state level of it for recreational purposes is probably a nonevent is the truth of the matter. And then also, as we track what everybody else is tracking and we look at the numbers, we really can't see any real impact in terms of how it's affecting beverage alcohol in general even in the states -- or now six states, including California where it's been legalized. So as, I guess, I've said in the past, it's probably not worth getting into a big debate right now about whether it's cannibalistic or complementary. There's just not enough information, I think, to really say how that's going to affect beverage alcohol in general going forward. What we do know is it's going to be a big market, however, worldwide.
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Robert Ottenstein of Evercore ISI.
Robert Ottenstein
Analyst
Just following on the last question. I'm wondering if you could give us any details or further details on your plans in Canada in terms of building out a sales team there, the sort of products you will be looking to develop or codevelop and kind of the general strategy. And I understand this is very early days and it's still very much a learning process, but would just love to get a sense of how you're thinking about it and what sort of investments on the ground that you'd be looking to put in place and thoughts on route-to-market.
Robert Sands
Analyst
Yes. So we are making investments. We have started building an organization in Canada. I'd characterize it more as a marketing organization than a sales organization because our partner, Canopy, has a sales organization and will continue to build their sales organization as well, and we expect to partner with them. But we have put a team in place to work with Canopy generally in evolving a lot of what they do in terms of consumer research, marketing, a lot of the standard sort of CPG stuff that we have a fairly deep knowledge and expertise in. And they, as a newer company, really focused on a totally emerging category and anticipated extremely high growth, haven't become fully developed in yet. So we've got our team working with their team, and we expect to attack that market together really when, in our case, beverages become legal, which is either going to be with the initial recreational legalization in 2018 or in 2019. I think the sort of the -- right now, the official government stance is that edibles will come in 2019, but it's kind of unclear whether they're lumping beverages into that or what they might do in 2018. So the best guess we have right now or the official word is probably beverages in 2019. And then in terms of what we're developing with Canopy, it is, as it relates to Constellation, beverages, nonalcoholic beverages which would include cannabis, so -- or be infused with cannabis. So we're working on the development of those products and things like branding, et cetera, at this time. But given sort of the time frame, we don't have everything fully baked nor should we or would we at this point in time as to exactly what the product is in terms of flavors, in terms of packaging, in terms of branding. Canopy's got a strong brand of its own even currently, which uses in the medical marijuana side of the business called Tweed, T-W-E-E-D, and I think that brand has a lot of potential as well.
Robert Ottenstein
Analyst
Great. And just following up on that, what sort of organization would you need in Québec?
Robert Sands
Analyst
Well, we haven't really, I'd say, gotten that far that we're thinking about organizations by province. But as I said, in terms of like a larger sales organization, that will really be done through Canopy as it specifically relates to Canada. So I wouldn't see us building a huge sales organization necessarily, but we will build some significant capabilities and make some investments next year.
David Klein
Analyst
Yes. So Robert, when we provide guidance for the year on our next call, we'll talk about investments in cannabis. But clearly, there will be some.
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Bryan Spillane of Bank of America.
Bryan Spillane
Analyst
Just had a couple of follow-up questions, David, I guess, on the comments on tax. One was just I wanted to clarify the benefit that you're expecting. Is that relative to the fiscal '18 20% rate? Or is it benefit relative to your long-term guidance on tax rate?
David Klein
Analyst
Well, Bryan, what we said in the script was that it would be beneficial to the low to mid-20s kind of long-term guidance rate. But we'll have a lot more specifics when we get to CAGNY because, as you can imagine, it's complicated even to understand what's in the regs as well as working through how to apply it to our business. But I can say that we're pretty confident that it's going to be below the long-term guidance and likely in line with the 20% rate that we threw out for the remainder of this year or for this year.
Bryan Spillane
Analyst
And then do you think that it will have a positive effect on free cash flow? So as you kind of look at cash taxes, cash tax rates, any sense yet as to -- in terms of whether there's a real tangible cash benefit that you'd expect to receive?
David Klein
Analyst
So again, we're still working through this. But before we said -- we provided guidance on an effective tax rate and we said that the cash tax rate would be somewhere around 500 basis points less than that while we're continuing to amortize some of our intellectual property over time. We suspect that, that will actually expand a little bit from 500 basis points, but we haven't -- we don't have final answers. We'll have those in several weeks at CAGNY.
Bryan Spillane
Analyst
But there's a chance that, that relationship between your cash tax rate and your new lower effective tax rate would be maintained?
David Klein
Analyst
Correct.
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Mark Swartzberg of Stifel Financial.
Mark Swartzberg
Analyst
A question on wine and spirits, Rob, but just as a point of information, this group called Smart Approaches to Marijuana points out that alcohol consumption has risen in Colorado post legalization. There's a lot of just really useful data there, I found. But wine and spirits, your year-to-date organic revenue was like plus 1%. Your fiscal '18 through fiscal '20 target is mid-single digits annually, and I hear you on the SKU rationalization. But how are you thinking about what's necessary to deliver that mid-single digits? Or do you think the mid-single digits is too high?
Robert Sands
Analyst
Well, what we expect is mid-single net sales growth for the year. That was our initial guidance range, and we feel pretty confident given sort of where we are right now, and how fourth quarter will go that we will be in that range. Year-to-date, we're about 4% growth on net sales, excluding the impact of Canada, so -- the Canada sales, so we feel pretty good. The market has slowed down a little bit, probably 100 basis points to 200 basis points versus where we thought the market would be for the year. That's probably the biggest factor that's impacting us relative to where we are in our range. We said that we think that we're more towards the low end than the high end of the range. It's probably the market that's impacting that. Lower end wines below premium seem to be being impacted, which actually could turn out to be good news. Because I think we continue to see an acceleration of premiumization, and we're seeing all of the growth really in the wine business starts to coalesce around price points which are substantially higher than they have been in the past. It used to be sort of the $8 to $12 range, and now we're seeing very strong growth, which is I'm sure hurting the lower end, between the $15 and $20 price points, which is still well within the commercial segments of the business. And we are particularly well positioned in some of those price points, and we'll continue to focus on those price points. And so over the last several years, we've become much more focused not in so much on that $8 to $12, but now in the $15 to even plus $20 range, where we think all of the growth is going to be in the future. We expect the wine category in general, there's a little bit of a slowdown in the second half of this year. As I said, could be a couple of 100 basis points. We think that the category will continue to be one of the faster or fastest-growing consumer products categories, outperforming consumer products in general. Year -- the whole -- the growth rate's been mid-single digits, almost 4%. We were at 4%. So we prefer to be at the high end of the range than the low end of the range, but we don't see anything happening here that is unusual or should constitute any kind of a warning sign. And in fact, as I said, the kind of growth we're seeing at the higher end of the commercial premium range, $15 to $20, I'd say is extremely encouraging for a lot of brands in our portfolio in particular.
Mark Swartzberg
Analyst
I could have been clearer. I was thinking about your fiscal '18 through fiscal '20 objective of mid-single digits. And in the current fiscal year, you're getting about 300 basis points from acquisitions, so the underlying business is doing a 1%. So I was really thinking about, is it just keeping up the pace of acquisitions because, mid-single digits is not how your business is growing on an organic basis?
Robert Sands
Analyst
Yes. I would say that the -- excluding acquisitions, the underlying business has been a bit softer than we'd like to see it. And the numbers that you quoted are essentially correct, but I don't think that we see the short term or the quarter really being indicative of anything. And in fact, it's probably just timing, whether we're talking about the market or whether we're talking about our business overall, which we expect to be in line with those numbers that you quoted, mid-single digits.
David Klein
Analyst
Yes, we don't think we need to continue to add to the portfolio to hit those numbers. We expect that our portfolio can hold or grow share as it stands.
Mark Swartzberg
Analyst
And so do you think you can get margin expansion next year if you want that lift in organic growth?
Robert Sands
Analyst
Yes.
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Judy Hong of Goldman Sachs.
Eunjoo Hong
Analyst
So on the $3 billion share buyback announcement, it's a multiyear program. So it seems to leave you still with plenty of room for additional cash usage, especially with your free cash flow stepping up in fiscal '19 and with some other tax benefits also accruing. So I guess I'm just wondering why the board came up with this number. And to the extent that you don't have a big M&A opportunity, do you think that you can complete the program earlier than you expected? Just kind of thoughts around that program.
David Klein
Analyst
Yes. So Judy, we asked the board for the authorization so that we can be opportunistic, and we didn't want a necessarily a time horizon on it. And so they gave us a multiyear authorization, which is consistent with the way that we've always done it in the past. As we said before, after we've invested in our -- for our expansion needs, in particular in beer, it's our intent to keep the business somewhere in that 3.5x leverage ratio range, and we'll do that through returning cash to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases and then some M&A activity that's probably looks a lot like the M&A activity we've done over the past few years. So I would say that we were looking for flexibility in the multiyear repurchase and will be opportunistic.
Eunjoo Hong
Analyst
Okay, and then just a quick follow-up on beer depletion. Can you comment at all on the December trend? Just because obviously, last year, we had a pretty weak December, and just wanted to see if you get -- you have any color just in terms of what you saw this December.
Robert Sands
Analyst
You're talking beer, right?
Eunjoo Hong
Analyst
Yes, beer.
Robert Sands
Analyst
Yes, we're expecting a pretty strong fourth quarter on beer depletions is the bottom line.
David Klein
Analyst
And December is performing in line with us getting to that strong quarter, so we're comfortable.
Robert Sands
Analyst
I would say in general, our beer depletions are pretty much right where we expected them to be and right where they should be, sort of around that 10% number. So it's good. It's good. The quarter -- this quarter, it was 9.1%. We're expecting a strong fourth quarter in beer.
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Bonnie Herzog of Wells Fargo.
Bonnie Herzog
Analyst
I just I want to stay on this topic, just in terms of depletions versus shipments. And certainly recognize, there's usually some seasonality, timing differences, but there's still a decent delta between the two during this quarter, and even the last quarter or two. So could you help us better understand the dynamic? And are these two then tracking more closely right now? Or is there still a pretty big delta? And then curious if you could comment on the end or consumer demand, and how you expect this to progress throughout the year given the planned marketing campaigns that you mentioned as well as your new innovation.
Robert Sands
Analyst
So in the quarter, shipments were below depletions quite considerably, I think around 6% versus 9%. That would be entirely a timing-of-shipment matter, and we don't expect that delta to be anything like that as we approach the year-end. Year-to-date ships are up 8.4%, and depletions are up 9.5%. So on the year-to-date, we're seeing it a lot closer. But definitely third quarter, there was a timing-of-shipment matter that -- and I say matter, there's nothing unusual. It's just that shipments lagged a little bit more than usual behind depletions in third quarter, but we don't expect that to be a trend or that there'd be anything -- or that there's anything unusual. I mean, it could be how we ship in the last day. I mean, so it's not -- there's nothing going on there. And then your other question, Bonnie?
Bonnie Herzog
Analyst
Just trying to get a sense of the current consumer demand right now. You have touched on that with the previous question, but I'm more curious how you expect that to progress throughout the year.
Robert Sands
Analyst
If you're talking about [indiscernible] business, we think that it's very strong. And that would be evidenced by the very strong measured consumer takeaway with IRI, for instance, which is -- was more like at 16.5% for the quarter. So we don't see any issue with the consumer whatsoever. In fact, consumer takeaway is very strong right now especially in the measured channels.
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Tim Ramey of Pivotal Research group.
Timothy Ramey
Analyst
I kind of wanted to press on the tax issue, not from the perspective on what it will do to your rate. But particularly in the wine industry, there's a lot of goodies there for the industry. And since many of your competitors or most of your competitors are privately held, do you expect this will sort of fall to the bottom line in perhaps accelerated promotion or maybe leaving prices alone when -- because you'll have a margin benefit? How do you think this will play through the market, is kind of the thrust of my question.
Robert Sands
Analyst
Well, for us, I would say that we would plan on letting sort of the...
Operator
Operator
Ladies and gentlemen, I apologize. There will be a slight delay in today's conference. Please hold. The conference will resume momentarily. [Technical Difficulty].
Patty Yahn-Urlaub
Analyst
We're back online.
Operator
Operator
Yes, you may resume the call.
Robert Sands
Analyst
I got cut off in mid-sentence, but I was answering Tim's question, and he was asking about the effect of tax reform in general on the industry. And what I was saying was that it was going to be -- we believe it's going to be positive. People are going to have more money in their pocket. And we think that certainly, as it relates to premium products, that's going to be very healthy for the industry. So all good news. No bad news on that front.
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Stephen Powers of Deutsche Bank.
Stephen Powers
Analyst
David, if I could, I want to come back to -- I think it was Dara's original question on beer margins for Q4 and just reframe it in sequential terms versus Q3. I think your comments on seasonality implies some lessening P&L leverage in Q4. But by my math, your Q4 -- your implied Q4 guidance really doesn't show any falloff in sales versus Q3. So could you just maybe bridge the difference between Q3 and Q4 as you see it? I know you mentioned some hiring ahead of kind of first half '19 demand. But was there anything else going on? Because I guess depreciation comes at -- continues to ramp, so I get that. But on the other side, the peso seems cooperative. Glass benefit should continue to build, I would assume, and so on. So is it really just the incremental hiring that forms the delta between Q3 and Q4? Or is there something else?
David Klein
Analyst
So it's all of the above. So it's incremental depreciation as we bring more assets online. It's continued line commissioning costs, again, as we bring assets online. And remember, once we put something into production, the incremental costs go through the P&L as opposed to getting capitalized. We're hiring employees. I think we have like 100 employees that we're bringing in, production employees in Q4 to be prepared for the ramped up production season. And then there is historically in this year, there is seasonality at the net sales level in the beer business. So again, we're not expecting -- we're not -- I don't want to sit here and really apologize for the margins in the fourth quarter. I'm just suggesting that the margins will be a little bit lighter than they were in say, Q2 when we hit an all-time high. But understanding where we're going to end up with the margins is actually why we took up our guidance in -- or at least tightened the guidance to the top end of the EBIT growth range year-over-year.
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Andrea Teixeira of JPMorgan.
Andrea Teixeira
Analyst
I'd like to follow up on the beer volumes commentary. I just wanted to clarify. Did you mean that the fourth quarter shipment will be more in line with depletions or just for the year as you do the year-to-date? As you correctly pointed out, the difference year-to-date is definitely narrower. But you're talking about fourth quarter coming up to be obviously, catching up with depletions and with shipments against depletions accelerating above shipments, accelerating above depletions to match the year-to-date. And then I'd also would like to follow up on the capital structure. Is your new buyback plan an indication that the uses of capital will be more heavily weighted on towards cash return to shareholders or compared to strategic M&A?
David Klein
Analyst
So on the billings and depletions kind of alignment, first of all, in terms of -- at the end of the year, we'll deplete and ship about the same number of cases. The percentages will be off a little bit just because of the starting point from last year. But we -- I think the best way to do your math is to come back in line with the 9% to 11% net sales growth and the 1% to 2% pricing algorithm, kind of putting you in the very high-single digits in net sales. And again, that's kind of where we are year-to-date on the depletions basis. In terms of capital structure, Andrea, I would say that what the authorization represents is that we're getting closer to the time where we have more and more free cash flow to deploy, and we're saying that we're going to use that in all the ways we have before. But clearly, we're going to buy back a lot of our stock because we continue to believe that the company is undervalued.
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of Caroline Levy of Macquarie.
Caroline Levy
Analyst
My question's around Corona, your flagship brand. If you could talk about what the trends were like in the last quarter, in the third quarter, and how you're thinking about potential cannibalization with Corona Premier or with Familiar on your existing brand. Is that something you're going to be watching very closely, where you don't want to see your flagship Corona dip, even if it is a positive margin trade? So just to talk a little bit about how should we be thinking about that April launch.
Robert Sands
Analyst
Yes. So we think Corona remains healthy, very healthy in fact, given its maturity. It was up about 3% in the quarter.
David Klein
Analyst
Beer [ph] depletions, right?
Robert Sands
Analyst
Yes, on depletions. And that's pretty consistent with where it's tracking, so we see good growth there and good continued growth. Now Corona is the most -- Corona Extra per se is the most mature of the brands in the portfolio. But given its state of maturity and the large market shares it has in particular places, we think it's doing very well, and we think that it will continue to do well. And then you asked about Premier, and I think that your question was on cannibalization. And yes, I mean, we're looking at that. We tested it. The cannibalization was probably less than we thought that it would be in fact, which was encouraging. The cannibalization is not a problem per se because it's not a lower-margin product. But we, nevertheless, wanted everything to be more at -- we want one plus one to add up to three, which is what all indications were in our test market. So yes, we'll be looking at the cannibalization, but you can imagine that it's two different consumers to a certain degree, meaning the people that are going to be attracted to a Premier are going to be people who are already drinking some version of a light and low-carbohydrate beer, like a Mich Ultra, okay. And people that are drinking Corona are obviously doing so without regard to it being not a light or low-carbohydrate beer. So just logically, we don't expect there to be a lot of cannibalization there.
Operator
Operator
Your final question will come from the line of Bill Chappell with SunTrust.
William Chappell
Analyst
I'll try to do two quick ones. One, just follow up on tax. I understand you're still trying to figure out the final benefit. But has there been any discussion from the board of the company of kind of how much of that will be spent back or reinvested? Or how you would spend the extra money in your pocket? And then my other question, just on the business. Any kind of update on on-premise and kind of how that's trending? We heard from different sources that there've been a lot of taps added for craft and all types of brands on-premise. And it seems maybe, you're not getting the volume terms, and so maybe there's some reversal there. So if you could you give us some update there, that would be great.
David Klein
Analyst
So in terms of tax, unlike a lot of companies that had -- that are sitting on piles on cash overseas and they're looking for something to do with it in the next several months, our situation's a little different in that we've already heavily invested the cash that we generated overseas into things like our breweries in Mexico as well as our Canopy investment in Canada. And so for us, I think the cash flow benefits that we think accrue over time get deployed along the lines of the rest of our -- or our previously stated capital allocation strategy, which is continue to invest in the business, return cash to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases, and occasionally where we can get in a growth accretive and ROIC accretive sort of M&A transaction, we'll look at that as well. So I would say that, that piece doesn't change. And then in terms of on-premise, our beer business continues to do really well, I think for the last -- this quarter, we're up high single digits. I think that's been a consistent trend over the last several quarters. And so we're just seeing continued strong performance of our brands and the brands in the on-premise, even while during the same time, overall trends in the on-premise have been down, call it low single digits.
Operator
Operator
I'll now return the call to Rob Sands for any additional or closing remarks.
Robert Sands
Analyst
Okay. Well, thank you, everybody, for joining our call today. We certainly -- we apologize for the line going dead for a few minutes, but we rectified that. I would say that our business has performed exceptionally well for the first nine months of fiscal '18, and we are very confident that we'll continue to sustain our profitable growth by executing on our TBA premiumization strategy. Just as a reminder, during our next quarterly call, we will be providing guidance for the upcoming fiscal year. Prior to that, we look forward to seeing many of you at the Beer Industry Summit conference in a couple of weeks and at the CAGNY conference in late February, where we'll be providing updates on our strategic business initiatives. So thanks again, everybody, for joining the call, and have a great day.
Operator
Operator
Thank you. That does conclude the Constellation Brands Third Quarter 2018 Earnings Conference Call. You may now disconnect.