Using Shuriken, can you change a particle's aspect ratio?

I have a particle of some text for an effect I am doing. However, the particle system squishes the text horizontally. I need the text to be readable.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/4688528/uni/uni.html

In my efforts to solve this, all I have been told is to do it in sprites, to make it mesh, but I want to confirm before I do a workaround, that the particle lacks a basic function such as particle aspect ratio.

I would prefer to do this in particles, since I'm just going for an effect.