Reuters: Hot Stocks: UPDATE 2-Scholastic raises outlook as Hunger Games sales soar

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UPDATE 2-Scholastic raises outlook as Hunger Games sales soar Mar 15th 2012, 14:10 Thu Mar 15, 2012 10:10am EDT * Raises FY2012 rev outlook to $2 bln, EPS from cont ops to $2.60-$2.90 * Q3 loss from continuing ops $0.09 vs est $0.70 * Q3 revenue $467 mln vs est $393 mln * Shares up 25 pct March 15 (Reuters) - Children's publisher Scholastic Corp raised its full-year profit forecast on soaring sales of 'The Hunger Games' books and its growing education business in Asia, sending its shares up as much as 25 percent to a nine-year high. Sales of Suzanne Collins' popular series of young adult novels reached a high point in the third quarter ahead of the release of a movie based on it next week. Scholastic, which also publishes the Harry Potter series in the United States, sees 2012 earnings from continuing operations at $2.60 to $2.90 per share, and revenue at about $2 billion. It had earlier forecast earnings per share of $1.75 to $2.10 on revenue of about $1.9 billion. "Year-to-date gains in profitability put us in a good position to achieve this guidance even as we face a comparison against last year's strong fourth-quarter results in educational technology and services when we launched READ 180 Next Generation," Chief Financial Officer Maureen O'Connell said. READ 180 is the company's educational program aimed at improving reading skills among school children. Year-on-year comparisons would also be affected by strong sales of Harry Potter books last year, ahead of the release of the final movie in the series. For the third quarter, net loss from continuing operations narrowed to $3.2 million, or 9 cents a share, from $25.1 million, or 77 cents a share, a year ago. Revenue for the quarter rose 22 percent to $467 million. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S expected Scholastic to post a loss of 70 cents a share on revenue of $393 million in the quarter. Scholastic stock, one of the top percentage gainers on the Nasdaq on Thursday, was trading up 21 percent at $38.99 in heavy volumes. They rose to $40.17 earlier in the session. Link this Share this Digg this Email Reprints

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