News

Quarto wary over US situation

21 August 2008 13:16:00

Heavy one-off costs pushed book publisher Quarto deep into the red in the first half, though the underlying picture was stronger than expected.

Quarto lost £3.1m in the first six months of 2008 compared to a profit of £400,000 last time. Revenue increased by 20% to £43.8m with underlying operating profit up by 33% to £2.3m.

Co-edition segment revenues rose by 12% to £13.4m and operating profit by 85% to £0.7m. This segment's second half is historically much the stronger, Quarto said.

Publishing segment revenues rose by 24% to £30.4m, aided by a first time contribution from MBI. The discontinuance of art print publishing meant a one-off charge of £2.6m.

""Thanks to our diversified international portfolio, trading in the first half was much stronger than we might have expected. The Co-edition segment produced extremely good results," chairman and chief executive Laurence Orbach said.

"With 60% of our (publishing) revenues arising in the United States, much will depend upon trading in the last quarter of the year," he added.

The interim dividend is unchanged at 3.15p.

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