* Recurring op profit 1.846 bln eur vs poll avg 1.856 bln
* Debt-reduction priority, but plans no more cash calls
* Will give no fiscal full-year forecasts until November
* Shares fall 4.5 percent
(Adds U.S. rival results, detail, analyst comment)
By James Regan
PARIS, Sept 3 (Reuters) - French spirits group Pernod Ricard on Thursday predicted a tough year as the drinks market stagnates and said it would focus on disposals and generating cash to reduce its debt pile.
The world's second-largest spirits group behind Diageo posted a 21 percent rise in recurring operating profit for the year to June 30, in line with forecasts, due to growth in France, Asia and Latin America.
But Chief Executive Pierre Pringuet told a news conference he would wait until the annual shareholder meeting on Nov. 2 to give forecasts for the current year, as Pernod had done in the past.
The business trend in July and August had not changed from the final quarter, he added.
"For 2009/10, Pernod Ricard anticipates a general economic environment that will remain difficult and an overall stagnation of the Wines & Spirits industry, with contrasting situations depending on countries and categories," Pernod said.
Diageo warned last week that it would not see a recovery until 2010 at the earliest, prompting it to cut its growth target. The maker of Smirnoff vodka and Guinness beer added that trading would likely stabilise in the second half of 2009.
Pringuet told a conference call that his views of the market were similar to Diageo's and added that the market would be stable at best this fiscal year.
U.S. group Brown-Forman Corp, the maker of Jack Daniel's whiskey and Southern Comfort, left its fiscal full-year earnings forecast unchanged on Wednesday despite posting a much better-than-expected first-quarter profit.
Pernod, which owns Absolut vodka, Malibu liqueur and aniseed drink Ricard, said full-year recurring operating profit was 1.846 billion euros ($2.63 billion), compared with the 1.856 billion average estimate from 10 analysts in a Reuters poll.
Recurring net profit was up 13 percent at 1.01 billion euros, slightly ahead of the poll estimate of 998.9 million.
Brown-Forman warned that deep discounting throughout the industry could reappear or even accelerate in the upcoming holiday season.
Shares in Pernod Ricard fell 4.5 percent on Thursday, the worst performers on the French benchmark CAC 40 index.
"The group is not offering any guidance for FY 2010 at this stage, and the CEO is warning about a tough H1 and a generally difficult and stagnant market for spirits," said analyst Simon Hales at Evolution Securities.
CM-CIC Securities analyst Francis Pretre was upbeat.
"We remain fundamentally positive on this group, which posts good performances both in industrialised and emerging countries -- especially China, which has not been the case at Diageo," Pretre said.
The company confirmed that its priority remained to reduce debt by selling assets and generating cash, as well as to invest in its 15 strategic brands.
Pringuet told BFM Radio the group would not make a further cash call to shareholders to reduce its 10.9 billion euros of net debt.
Instead the company will pursue its 1 billion euro asset disposal programme and aim to generate free cash flow from recurring operations of close to 3 billion euros over the three years to 2010/11.
The group had generated 700 million euros from asset sales so far, including the disposal of the Tia Maria coffee liqueur brand in July, it said.
The company said it aimed to lower its average cost of borrowing from 4.8 percent last year to close to 4.5 percent in the current year.
For an analysis on Pernod Ricard, please double click on ($1=.7023 Euro) (Editing by Will Waterman and Karen Foster)