Net income increased 21% to $258 million, or $1.53 a share, from $213 million, or $1.23, a year earlier, the Greensboro, N.C.-based company said in a financial statement. Sales rose 14% to $1.09 billion, helped by higher cigarette prices.
Newport, the top-selling U.S. menthol cigarette, increased its share of smokers after Winston-Salem, N.C.-based [image-nocss] Reynolds American Inc. reduced marketing of Kool, a rival brand, according to Judy Hong, a Goldman Sachs Group Inc. analyst in New York. Demand for Newport spurred an 8.2% increase in Lorillard shipments to 9.43 billion cigarettes.
"Sales and operating growth were very strong," Hong wrote today in a note to clients.
Newport's U.S. market share increased 0.32 percentage point to 9.86%. Shipments of Newport, which accounts for a third of U.S. menthol cigarette sales, rose 6.4% to 8.21 billion units. Excluding tobacco excise taxes, Lorillard's $912 million in sales exceeded the $859 million average of three analysts' estimates compiled by Bloomberg.
By revenue, Lorillard trails Altria Group Inc., New York, which owns cigarette maker Richmond, Va.-based Philip Morris USA and snuff producer Stamford, Conn.-based UST Inc., and Reynolds, which sells Grizzly and Kodiak snuff as well as cigarettes.
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