Soaps (of the TV variety) are something you either love or hate. But if you think EastEnders is down-market, you should try the telenovelas popular with teenagers in Latin America. Fortunately for Dori Media, it looks as if much of Asia and Eastern Europe is catching the telenovela bug, too.

Dori is an Israeli company traded on AIM, which produces, distributes, broadcasts and merchandises telenovelas and has long operated its own soap channel in Israel. International sales, however, are the growth area. Last year, broadcasting and format rights sales doubled, and international sales accounted for nearly three-quarters of the total (up 46 per cent from the previous year).

Dori launched its own channel in Indonesia (Televiva Vision 2) and achieved breakthrough sales in Spain, Germany and Eastern Europe. With turnover now split roughly equally between Israel, Latin America and Europe, Dori can rightly claim that telenovelas have become a global market.

The stock market has woken up to Dori and the shares have been among the strongest performers on AIM over recent weeks but at the current 177.5p, there is certainly further to go with Dori still trading at a discount to the TV production sector when many would argue they should be trading at a premium.

Dori has a library of 3,500 hours of telenovelas and added around 800 hours in 2006. Reporting in dollars, it trebled profits last year to $5.1 million (£2.75 million) and it looks like lifting the total by at least $2 million (£1 million) in 2007 as launch losses in Indonesia fall away. That would throw up earnings of between 15p and 16p per share, valuing the business on a forward p/e of no more than 11.8 times earnings – a substantial discount to competitors. The shares could add a further 50 per cent and still not look pricey in comparison with most of the other independent quoted TV production companies.

Dori is likely to expand its own broadcasting operations with the launch of new channels in Europe and Asia over the next couple of years. That will doubtless restrain profits growth. The Indonesian channel lost $1.5 million (£750,000) in its first year but the City is likely to take that into account and look at the underlying numbers. Dori is an exceptional growth stock in an attractive sector and the shares are a buy.