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North Carolina Blocked from Collecting Amazon Customer Data in Sales Tax Dispute
A few days after becoming enmeshed in a sales tax issue in Texas, Amazon won a round regarding North Carolina, where the online retail giant is in court over a sales tax dispute. A federal judge ruled against North Carolina's request for Amazon customer data, stating that the request is unconstitutional, violating First Amendment rights.
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McGraw-Hill Education Posts Good Third Quarter
A boost in state adoptions, particularly in Texas, helped lift revenue at McGraw-Hill Education 5.5% in the third quarter, to $1.1 billion, while operating profits, aided by cost controls, increased nearly 20%, to $357.5 million. Revenue for the school education group rose 6.7%, to $534.7 million in the quarter, while sales in the higher education, professional and international group increased 4.3%, to $520.0 million.
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Penguin Sales up 5%
In an update on its nine month results, Pearson said that sales for Penguin rose 5%. A tough retail environment, Pearson said, has been offset by "strong publishing and rapid growth in e-book sales."
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Print, Digital Book Sales Accelerated in Third Quarter, Amazon Says
Amazon posted its usual big jump in top line sales, with the third quarter revenue increasing 38.7%, to $7.56 billion, while net income rose 16%, to $231 million. The largest gains came in its electronics and other general merchandise segment where sales rose 68% overall and 80% in North America. The segment, which benefited from acquisitions, is home to sales of the Kindle. Media sales grew at a much more modest rate, up 14% in total and 13% in North America.
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iPad Total Nears 7.5 Million
Apple sold 4.19 million iPads in the quarter ended September 30, the company said yesterday, bringing the total sold to just under 7.5 million since the device was released in April.
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OverDrive Gets New Investor
OverDrive, the global distributor of e-books, audiobooks and digital content services to retailers, libraries, and schools, announced this morning that it has received new funding from Insight Venture Partners, a private equity firm focused on technology companies. With what was termed a major investment, Peter Sobiloff and Larry Handen, both managing directors at Insight, will join OverDrive's board.
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AAP August Sales Report
In August, for the second consecutive month, e-book sales jumped while sales in all print trade segments declined, according to AAP's monthly sales estimates.
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Barnes & Noble Sets Shareholder Meeting
Barnes & Noble will hold a special shareholder meeting November 17 to vote on the adoption of the company's Shareholder Rights Plan that was passed by B&N's board of directors last fall in response to the rapid accumulation of its shares by Ron Burkle. The implementation of the poison pill was one factor that led Burkle to field an alternative slate of candidate to oppose the B&N-backed nominees led by chairman Len Riggio. It was not known whether Burkle will work to block ratification of the plan.
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2010 Ranking of the Global Publishing Industry
Livres Hebdo has released its annual rankings of publishing companies from across the world, published in cooperation with Buchreport (Allemagne), The Bookseller (United Kingdom) and Publishers Weekly (USA). The rankings were released at the Frankfurt Book Fair.
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Industry Stocks: September Performances
Helped by a 7.8% increase in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the Publishers Weekly Stock Index jumped 15.5% in September, with all but one of the companies on the Index posting an increase in their stock price.
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Spending on Books Dips
A Bowker PubTrack Consumer analysis of second-quarter market trends shows declines in the price paid per book, number of books purchased per buyer, and in the overall dollars spent per buyer.
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Borders Approves Shareholder Proposals
Borders Group's largest shareholder, Bennett LeBow, cemented his control over the retailer late Thursday afternoon when shareholders approved two proposals at a special shareholders meeting. The approval came a day after the company delayed the meeting for 24 hours.
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AAP July Sales Report
In what was a generally dismal month for the print trade categories, e-book sales rose 150.2%, to $40.8 million, in July at the 14 publishers that supply results to the Association of American Publishers' monthly sales report.
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Scholastic Shrugs Off Lackluster First Quarter
First quarter sales for the period ended August 31 fell 7.8% at Scholastic, to $290.9 million, and the net loss increased to $35.2 million from $23.0 million in the comparable quarter in fiscal 2010. Despite the results, the company said it remained on track to meet its earlier forecast of total sales for fiscal 2011 of between $1.9 and $2.0 billion and earnings per share from continuing operations in the $1.95 to $2.20 range.
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E-book Sales Jump 150% in July
After increasing by "only" 118% in June, e-book sales jumped 150.2% to $40.8 million at the 14 publishers that report e-book sales in July. Sales for the first seven months of the year were up 191%, to $219.5 million.
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Advisory Firm Backs Burkle
The proxy advisory firm Institutional Shareholders Services recommended this morning that shareholders back the three candidates nominated for the Barnes & Noble board by Ron Burkle, B&N's largest outside shareholder involved in a proxy battle with the country's largest bookstore chain. Last week a smaller advisory firm, Glass Lewis, backed the B&N slate led by chairman Len Riggio. In backing Burkle, ISS agreed with his argument that the B&N board is too closely tied to Riggio and his family.
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Barnes & Noble Nominees Get Support
Glass Lewis & Co., an independent financial research firm that makes recommendations on how institutional investors should vote their shares, has come out in favor of the Barnes & Noble-backed board nominees in the retailer's proxy battle with Ron Burkle.
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Book Exports Dipped in First Half of 2010
Book exports slipped 0.8% in the first six months of 2010, to $911.1 million, according to estimates released from the U.S. Commerce Department. The decline was due to shipments to a number of smaller markets as exports to America's top 15 book trading partners rose 3.5%. The largest increase in exports was to Mexico, driven by a huge gain in the demand for professional books.
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Wiley Has Good Start to Fiscal 2011
Led by double-digit gains in its professional/trade and higher education divisions, total revenue at John Wiley & Sons rose 5% in the first quarter ended July 31, to $408 million and net income jumped to $44 million from $26.9 million in the comparable quarter last year. Excluding the impact of foreign exchange, sales rose 9%. The improved profitability was attributed in part to increase sales of digital products that Wiley said have higher margins than print products.
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Industry Stocks: August performance
After rising 8.4% in July, the Publishers Weekly Stock Index fell 2.8% in August as prices fell at 11 companies while increasing at just four. Still, the decline was less than the 4.3% drop posted by the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
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