Bumper profits expected for Harry Potter publishers

A stable of bestselling titles is expected to generate a strong performance from Bloomsbury next Wednesday.

Analysts believe the publishing company will build on impressive interim results, which included a 78.3% increase in turnover to £11.4m and gross profit rising by 40.5% to £4.5m.

Best-selling authors published by Bloomsbury include Will Self, Margaret Atwood and Harry Potter's creator JK Rowling.

The meteoric success of the Harry Potter quartet has played a major part in swelling group revenues over the past year, with 90 million books being published worldwide.

Nigel Newton, chief executive of Bloomsbury, says: "Sales of the series were already enormous and we'd published the paperback of the third book last April.

"That was already extremely high, but there was a gear change following the launch of Goblet of Fire, which was itself bigger than we expected."

Analysts are predicting a strong showing for the fledgling US operation, with a $500,000 pre-empt of world rights to Ethical Ambition already paying dividends.

There has also been an encouraging response to the group's online magazine, launched last December.