Digital spurs Pearson past expectations
THIS will be the year that digital revenues overtake traditional sales at Pearson, which grew pre-tax profits 72 per cent on an unadjusted basis to £1.16bn in fiscal 2011.
Pearson, the educational services group that owns Penguin and the Financial Times, beat market expectations and its own forecasts to report adjusted earnings per share of 86.5p and raised its dividend by nine per cent to 42p.
Adjusted sales were up one per cent to £5.86bn while adjusted operating profit grew seven per cent to £942m.
Pearson said it rolled in £2bn from digital sales – an 18 per cent increase on the previous year, making the sector accountable for a third of the group’s sales.
It credited strong e-book downloads of Penguin bestsellers and the FT’s iPad app, as well as the 43m students enrolled on learning programmes.
Despite refusing to deny that talks about selling the FT have taken place, Pearson chief executive Marjorie Scardino said: “The FT is not for sale, [it] is a very valuable part of Pearson, we are investing in it and we are very happy.”
Shares, which have climbed 20 per cent in the last year, dropped 3.8 per cent to £12.04 yesterday.