Harry Porter publisher's profit soars

Bloomsbury Publishing PLC more than tripled its profits in 2007 on strong sales of titles such as Khaled Hosseini's A Thousand Splendid Suns and the final Harry Potter book, the company said yesterday.

British-based Bloomsbury reported profit of $23.5 million compared with $7.3 million in 2006 according to preliminary results. Sales rose 100 percent to $300 million.

More than 2.6 million copies of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows sold out of British bookshops on the first day of release, and it will be published in paperback in July. The seven books in the Harry Potter series are now selling in boxed sets.