HMV profits and sales soar

Kylie Minogue and other artists bring in the cash

The UK books, music and multi-media seller HMV has kicked off the Christmas season by reporting a strong performance during the autumn.

Strong sales of the blockbuster DVD movie Traffic and popular CDs from Kylie Minogue and Nelly Furtado boosted its earnings, as did well-selling computer games.

Delia Smith has fuelled book sales for more than a decade

And a string of new releases have been carefully timed to pull in the business ahead of the festive period, including compilation CDs from Madonna and Step.

Billy Conolly and George Best's biographies and Delia Smith's new cook book are expected to be popular Christmas presents this year.

This should boost the performance of HMV's book shop, Waterstone's, the company said.

Sweet music

HMV Group traditionally makes well over half its earnings during the last three months of the year.

The UK music market is not shrinking

The music market is shrinking across most of the world, though not in the UK, said Mr Giles.

"Unless there are unforeseen events, Christmas, particularly here in the UK, will be very good," chief executive Alan Giles said.

"All the reports from the stores suggest a lot of customers are out there and the range of products we have to work with is very strong."

Decent earnings

The group achieved an almost 20% rise in earnings to £21.5m during the August to October months.

The strong earnings helped cut HMV Media's pre-tax loss for the first six months of the fiscal year from April to £15.9m from £34m.

HMV slashed about a fifth off its £473m debts.

"With a strong release schedule in music, DVD, computer games - and [with] net borrowings almost £95m less than a year ago - the group is very well placed as it enters the Christmas season," said Mr Giles.

The group said its earnings should reach £120-125m for the full accounting year that ends on 31 March 2002.

The EMI record company that releases Beatles and Rolling Stones music owns almost half the shares in HMV Group.