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Sales Fall at Lagardere Publishing
Lagardere reported this morning that total revenue in its publishing segment fell 5.9%, to €2.04 billion, or 4.4% excluding foreign exchange in 2011.
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Market Watch: Industry Stocks: January Performances
Led by a 12.3% increase in the stock price of Amazon, the Publishers Weekly Stock Index rose 4.6% in January, beating the 3.4% gain posted by the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Amazon, however, gave back a good part of the increase on February 1, the day after the company reported fourth-quarter revenue that fell short of expectations and issued a lackluster forecast for the first quarter.
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AAP November Sales Report
The children’s/YA hardcover segment stole the spotlight from e-books in November with sales jumping 38.0% due largely to the strong showing of Inheritance, which sold more than 400,000 hardcover copies in its first week on sale in November.
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Tough Week for Amazon
Despite posting a 35% sales increase for the fourth quarter and earnings that were better than expected (if still down compared to a year ago), last week was a tough one for Amazon. Analysts and investors were disappointed in the quarterly report, and the stock price for the nation’s largest online retailer fell almost 8% the day after the earnings report was released on Tuesday, though it bounced back a bit on Thursday. Analysts have long worried that Amazon was investing too heavily in its business, but that hasn’t stopped Amazon from keeping up those investments or its stock price rising (it has a 52-week high of $246.71). The most recent report, though, renewed concerns among some analysts that Amazon was not getting a high enough return on its investments.
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Arizona Wants $53 Million in Back Taxes from Amazon
In its just filed 10-K report, Amazon said that Arizona is seeking $53 million in uncollected sales tax for the period from March 1, 2006 through December 31, 2010.
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Children's, University Press, Audiobooks Rise in AAP Monthly Sales Report
November 2011 sales of children's and YA hardcover titles rose 27% over the same period in 2010 and audiobook downloads rose 25.9% over the same period. However, November over November e-book sales, while up 65.9%, dropped below the monthly triple digit increases the category has shown.
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Books Up, Earnings Down at Amazon
Amazon reported big gains in revenue for both the fourth quarter and the full year but, as it had predicted, earnings in both periods fell. In addition, North America media segment, home to books and e-books, sales rose only 8% in the quarter, much slower than the 16% increase posted for the year.
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Weak School Year Drops Results at McGraw-Hill Education
Hurt by a 14% decline in revenue in its school group, total revenue at McGraw-Hill Education fell 6% in 2011, to $2.29 billion. Operating income fell 12%, to $320 million. During the year, MHE took a $34 million restructuring charge for severance related to a workforce reduction of about 540 positions.
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Weak Publishing Results Hurt Courier
Sales rose 3% at Courier Corp. in the first quarter ended December 24, but problems in its publishing division led to a slight decline in net income.
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Sourcebooks Has Record Year, Led by E-book Sales
Sourcebooks had the best year in its history in 2011, founder Dominique Raccah reported on her blog post with total revenue up 19%. Growth was driven by sales of e-books plus sales to gift stores and mass merchants. While print book sales rose slightly, e-book growth skyrocketed 795%.
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Bloomsbury Reports Good Holiday Quarter
In a brief management update for the quarter ended December 31, Bloomsbury Publishing said results in the period were "strong," led by "a very wide range of titles."
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An Odd Third Quarter
The last days of Borders had a measurable impact on a number of industry trends in the third quarter of 2011.
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Investor Has 5.1% Stake in Barnes & Noble
In a filing this morning with the SEC, investor Daniel R. Tisch reported that he has acquired just over 3 million shares of Barnes & Noble stock, giving him a 5.1% stake in the company.
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Stocks Slipped In 2011
After two years of gains following the crash of 2008, the Publishers Weekly Stock Index pulled back slightly in 2011, falling 1.1%. Stock prices rose at only five companies while falling at nine; Hastings Entertainment had the largest loss in the year with its stock price plunging 73.8%.
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Print Units Fell 9% in 2011
The final numbers from Nielsen BookScan are in for 2011 and they show that print sales through the outlets it tracks fell by just over 9% in the year. Total units sold were 651.2 million.
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AAP October Sales Report
Sales in the mass market paperback segment took another big fall in October, down 37.6% at the seven houses that reported results to the AAP’s monthly sales report. With two months of 2011 to go, it appears the segment will lose about one-third of the sales it generated in 2010.
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Print Decline Accelerated In 2011
The cannibalization of print by digital accelerated in 2011, with unit sales in the outlets tracked by Nielsen BookScan falling 8.9% with one week to go in the year. The drop in print sales was double that of 2010, when units fell 4.5%. The decline from 2010 to 2011 sped up in all major categories and formats, and the categories where digital sales are having the greatest impact on the sale of print books didn’t change—adult fiction and mass market paperback.
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Investor Takes 6% Stake in Books-A-Million
An outside investor has acquired just over 1 million shares of Books-A-Million. The investment by Harsha Gowda, identified in his filing with the SEC as being with the Roseland, N.J.-based investment Blueshore Capital Management, gives him a 6.38% stake in the nation’s second largest bookstore chain.
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E-book Sales Rose 81% in October
E-book sales rose 81.2% in October, to $72.8 million, at the 20 publishers who supply e-book figures to the Association of American Publishers monthly sales report. Religious sales were up in the month at reporting houses, increasing 12.4%, but sales in the other print trade segments were down.
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