Publishers

Bertelsmann reported Q1 group revenues of €4.21 billion, up from €3.99 billion in the prior year’s quarter. Bertelsmann chairman and ceo Thomas Rabe said this was “one of its best first quarters in recent years” — since 2008, in fact. The company is no longer reporting EBITDA and group profit as part of the quarterly update, and as usual there were no details by division. Fuller figures will come in the half-year results. The company called out Penguin Random House’s “strong bestseller performance,” saying that Michelle Obama’s Becoming had continued to enjoy strong sales, with more than ten million copies […]

News Corp. reported fiscal third quarter sales on Thursday, with book publisher HarperCollins registering their seventh straight quarterly increase in sales. Building on the strong holiday quarter, sales once again rose 6 percent to $421 million, up $23 million from a year ago. And the gain would have been larger, since the new revenue recognition standard we have been explaining for a while now reduced revenues by $17 million in the quarter. (The way the standard has been applied, it raised Penguin Random House’s reported sales by €147 million or $173 million for the full year, and so far it […]

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt reported Q1 earnings May 9, for the period ending March 31, 2019, with sales of $194.6 million declining by just over $5 million, and seasonal net loss of ($117.4) million, $16 million worse than a year ago. With weakness across the educational publishing markets, as shown by the planned merger of Cengage and McGraw-Hill (itself a bigger competitor looming for HMH), Houghton’s stock was down about 25 percent in the first hour of trading on the weak report. Trade sales (now called HMH Books & Media, but otherwise representing the same segment) were $40.8 million, up $4.1 […]

Lagardere reported Q1 earnings Tuesday, with sales of €460 million in the book division, up €18 million compared to the same period last year. The strengthening US dollar contributed €12 million of the gain, however, and the purchase of Worthy Publishing added €2 million. Lagardere reports that the US business “delivered solid growth” (up 3.3 percent like for like), thanks to “good momentum” in digital audio books. Companywide, digital audio comprised 3.8 percent of sales, up from 2.5 percent a year ago, over 50 percent higher. France also saw “good momentum,” up 1.9 percent like for like, while the UK […]

CBS reported first quarter results on Thursday afternoon, with Simon & Schuster recording sales of $164 million,  up $4 million from the prior year period, attributed to “higher print book sales.” Operating income continued the long-term trend of steady improvement, up $1 million to $17 million. This marks the company’s seventeenth consecutive quarter of growth in profits. Counted outside of operating income was a $5 million charge as part of a CBS-wide voluntary restructuring plan. Similar to Penguin Random House’s voluntary separation offer last year, the initiative was “a one-time offer” of a voluntary buyout “based on a formula having […]