I'm not sure if there is much interest for these on here - but I've been following them this year. They have had a rapid climb recently - is it time to take profits?

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Pearson Fundamentals (PSON)

Interim Management Statement

Pearson January trading update
Pearson is today providing its regular January trading update. In addition, we have undertaken a rigorous, bottom-up review of our markets, our operations and our financial plans. As a result, we are taking further action to simplify our business, reduce our costs and position ourselves for growth in our major markets. To quantify how this will drive Pearson's financial performance, we are providing earnings guidance for 2016 and setting out where we would expect to be by the end of 2018.

• 2015 results: we expect to report adjusted operating profit of approximately £720m and earnings per share of between 69p and 70p. We also intend to propose an unchanged final dividend of 34p per share giving a total dividend for 2015 of 52p per share, up 2% on 2014.
• Simplification and growth: we are taking further action to simplify our business, reduce our costs and position ourselves for growth in our major markets. We will complete the majority of these actions by mid-year and incur implementation costs of approximately £320m in 2016 and expect to generate annualised savings of approximately £350m, with approximately £250m of these savings in 2016 and a further £100m of these savings in 2017.
• 2018 goals: with the full benefits of our restructuring programme, the launch of new products, and stability returning to US college enrolments and the UK qualifications market by the end of 2017, we expect adjusted operating profit to be at or above £800m in 2018.
• Sustaining the dividend: Pearson plans to hold its dividend at the 2015 level while it rebuilds cover, reflecting the Board's confidence in the medium term outlook.
• 2016 outlook: In 2016, we expect to report operating profit and adjusted earnings per share before the costs of restructuring of between £580m and £620m and between 50p and 55p, respectively, with the in-year benefits from restructuring offset by the loss of operating profit from disposals made in 2015, ongoing challenging conditions in our largest markets, the reinstatement of the employee incentive pool and other operational factors. We are excluding the one-off cost of this major restructuring to better reflect the underlying earnings potential of the business. Operating profit after restructuring charges is expected to be in the £260m to £300m range.
• We will hold a conference call at 7.30am on Thursday, 21 January to present our headline plans. We will provide further detail on our strategy and our key financial assumptions at our preliminary results presentation in February.

Pearson's chief executive John Fallon said:

"Our competitive performance during the last three years has been strong, but the cyclical and policy related challenges in our biggest markets have been more pronounced and persisted for longer than anticipated.

"Faced with these challenges, we are today announcing decisive plans to further integrate the business and reduce the cost base, rationalise our product development and focus on fewer, bigger opportunities."

Pearson's chairman Sidney Taurel said:

"Pearson is a company with strong market positions, real competitive advantage and a significant medium-term market opportunity. The Board believes that the restructuring that we're announcing today will help build on these strengths and position Pearson to take advantage of its market opportunities, enjoying sustained growth. I look forward to working with John and the executive team to deliver this agenda."

Investec Add 772.25 748.00 - Reiterates

Liberum Capital Sell 772.25 540.00 540.00 Reiterates

Pearson January trading update

We expect to deliver operating profit in line with guidance for 2016, despite a further unprecedented decline in Q4 2016 in our North American higher education courseware business. Our 2016 restructuring program has been delivered in full and the financial benefits are a little higher than planned.

We are today announcing actions to accelerate our digital transition in higher education, to manage the print decline, and to reshape our portfolio. Our guidance for 2017 reflects continued challenges and uncertainty in the North American higher education courseware market and we no longer expect to reach our prior operating profit goal for 2018. The Board intends to recommend a final dividend of 34p for an overall 2016 dividend of 52p in line with our guidance, but as a result of the factors above we intend to rebase our dividend from 2017 onwards.

2016 results: we expect to report adjusted operating profit and adjusted earnings per share of approximately £630m and 57p, respectively, with revenues down approximately 8% in underlying terms primarily due to weakness in North American higher education courseware. We have continued to manage discretionary cost tightly and are accruing around £55m less than originally planned for our 2016 staff incentive programme, enabling us to report within the guidance range we had previously set.

Other than North American higher education courseware, our businesses have in aggregate performed in line with expectations. Online Program Management, virtual schools and professional certification all continued to grow. As expected US school courseware was impacted by a smaller market and lower participation rate, but benefited from share gains in Open Territories. North American student assessment profits rose slightly despite significant declines in revenue as we offset the impact of contract losses with cost reductions and the benefits of a higher weighting to digital services. In Core, our UK qualifications business is seeing a stabilisation in exam registrations as expected, and our Growth markets have returned to profitability.

The North American higher education courseware market was much weaker than expected. Our net revenues fell 30% during the final quarter resulting in an unprecedented 18% decline for the full year. We estimate 2% of this decline was driven by lower enrolment, particularly in Community College and amongst older students; 3-4% by an accelerated impact from rental in the secondary market; and approximately 12% due to an inventory correction in the channel reflecting the cumulative impact of these factors in prior years.

2017 actions: Whereas we had previously anticipated a broadly stable North American higher education courseware market in 2017, we now assume that many of these downward pressures will continue. We are the market leader in US Higher Education and will use that leadership to accelerate our shift to digital and maximise the value of our stand-alone text offerings with the following actions:

1. We are accelerating work to simplify our product technology platform and enhancing our courseware service capabilities with £50m of additional investment, which will remove barriers to faster product innovation, accelerate our product roadmap by two years and drive faster adoption of institution-wide Digital Direct Access for Pearson courseware.
2. We are increasing our participation in the courseware rental market, by:
a. reducing eBook rental prices by up to 50% across 2,000 titles - making digital rental the best option for price-conscious students.
b. launching our own print rental program, piloting with an initial group of 50 titles made available through Pearson's approved rental partners, ensuring Pearson is paid more often for the usage of our courseware. If successful we will scale this program rapidly.

Reshaping our portfolio: we are additionally announcing the following actions to reshape our portfolio and capital structure:

1. With the integration of Penguin Random House complete, and with greater industry-wide stability on digital terms, we intend to issue an exit notice regarding our 47% stake in Penguin Random House to our JV partner Bertelsmann in the contractual window, with a view to selling our stake or recapitalising the business and extracting a dividend.
2. We will use proceeds from this action to maintain a strong balance sheet; invest in our business; and return excess capital to shareholders whilst retaining an investment grade credit rating.
3. We will propose a final dividend of 34p for an overall 2016 dividend of 52p in line with 2015 and our guidance. For 2017 we intend to rebase our dividend to reflect portfolio changes, increased investment, and our 2017 earnings guidance.
4. We will continue to reduce our exposure to large scale direct delivery services and focus on more scalable online, virtual, and blended services, across our portfolio.

Outlook: The challenges we have faced during 2016 mean we begin 2017 with a base level of underlying profitability that is around £180m lower than we had expected in early 2016. Our preliminary guidance range is for operating profit in 2017 of £570m to £630m, driving adjusted earnings per share of 48.5p to 55.5p. This is based on our existing portfolio, a 2017 net interest charge of £74m, a tax rate of 20% and exchange rates on 31 December 2016.

This guidance is based on assumptions incorporating further declines in enrolment and other pressures in the North American higher education courseware market in 2017. The top of the range implies that this is offset as the impact of the 2016 inventory correction at key channel partners partially unwinds resulting in net revenue growth in our North American higher education courseware business of approximately 1%. The bottom of our guidance range assumes that inventory levels continue to fall resulting in a 7% net revenue decline. The rest of business is expected to perform broadly in line with trends seen in 2016.

We are withdrawing our operating profit goal for 2018 reflecting portfolio changes and challenging and uncertain markets.

Conference call: We will hold a conference call for analysts at 8.30am on Wednesday, 18 January to present our headline plans. We will provide further detail on our strategy and our key financial assumptions at our preliminary results presentation in February.

Full Year results: Pearson will report its preliminary results on 24 February 2017.

Pearson's chief executive John Fallon said:

"The education sector is going through an unprecedented period of change and volatility. We have already taken significant steps on restructuring, reducing our cost base by £375m last year.

"However our higher education business declined further and faster than expected in 2016.

"So we are taking more radical action to accelerate our shift to digital models, and to keep reshaping our business."

Pearson's chairman Sidney Taurel said:

"We are facing difficult trading conditions in our largest business as we transition to digital, but as a Board, we are confident that the plan announced today will allow the company to navigate these conditions and build on its leading position in higher education."

Liberum Capital Sell 633.75 470.00 470.00 Reiterates

At the risk of plagiarism.......'Plop'.

What a load of rubbish this is.

and profit warnings come in 3s

Final Results

Pearson, the world's learning company, is announcing its preliminary full year results for 2016, following its 18 January trading statement. Key headlines include:

· 2016 operating profit and eps slightly better than January 2017 guidance. Strong 2016 cash conversion
o Sales of £4,552m declined 8% in underlying terms. Good growth in Pearson VUE, US Virtual Schools Online Program Management and Wall Street English in China was more than offset by expected declines in US and UK student assessment and US school courseware, and a much worse than expected decline in North American higher education courseware, as detailed in our 18 January trading statement.
o Deferred revenue was broadly level in underlying terms and is now 18% of our revenues (2015: 16.5%).
o Adjusted operating profit of £635m was down 21% in underlying terms due to weaker revenues, the partial reinstatement of incentives and other operational factors, partially offset by cost savings from the restructuring plan announced in January 2016, a larger contribution from Penguin Random House, helped in part by modest one-off benefits from the integration programme, and a return to profit in our Growth segment.
o Adjusted earnings per share fell 16% to 58.8p reflecting weaker operating results, higher interest and a higher tax rate of 16.5%, offset by the strength of the US Dollar and other currencies against Sterling.
o Operating cash flow increased 52% benefitting from tight working capital control, lower cash incentive payments and the weakness of Sterling. Our cash conversion increased to 104% (2015: 60%).
o Net debt increased to £1,092m (2015: £654m) reflecting the strengthening of the US Dollar relative to Sterling and restructuring costs.
o Digital & services revenues now make up 68% of our total revenues (2015: 65%). We have made good progress in simplifying our technology platforms and seen strong growth in key digital products Revel, iLit, Q-Interactive, Connections Education and global wins in Online Program Management.

· 2016 statutory results and goodwill impairment: Statutory loss for the year of £2,335m included an impairment of goodwill of £2,548m. This impairment charge is consistent with the challenging market conditions which we disclosed in January, and which resulted in an outlook for profit which is approximately £180m lower than previously anticipated.

· 2016 restructuring program: Our 2016 restructuring program was delivered in full, reducing our cost base exiting 2016 by £425m at a cost of £338m. Adjusting for the impact of currency our plan delivered slightly higher benefits at a slightly lower cost than planned.

· 2017 guidance, strategic actions to accelerate digital, simplify the portfolio and preserve financial flexibility
o 2017 outlook in line with 18 January trading statement: Our guidance range is for operating profit in 2017 of £570m to £630m, adjusted earnings per share of 48.5p to 55.5p and cash conversion in excess of 90%. This is based on our existing portfolio, a 2017 net interest charge of £74m, a tax rate of approximately 20%, and exchange rates on 31 December 2016.
o Trading in early 2017: Our early trading is in line with expectations. The phasing in our North American higher education courseware business in 2017 will show a benefit from returns normalising in the first half, whilst the underlying market pressures we have described will impact gross sales primarily in the second half.

o Higher education courseware strategic actions: On 18 January we announced a series of actions, accelerating our work to simplify our product technology platform and enhancing our courseware service capabilities with £50m of additional investment, reducing eBook rental prices and launching our own print rental program piloting with an initial group of 50 titles made available through Pearson's approved rental partners. We have reduced prices for eBook rental across 2,000 titles, have made good progress on our print rental program and are today announcing details of the first wave of new digital products with greater personalisation, enhanced engagement and cognitive tutoring.
o Simplifying Pearson
§ Penguin Random House: With the integration of Penguin Random House complete, and with greater industry-wide stability on digital terms, we have issued an exit notice regarding our 47% stake in Penguin Random House to our JV partner Bertelsmann, in the contractual window, with a view to selling our stake or recapitalising the business and extracting a dividend. We will use proceeds from this action to maintain a strong balance sheet; invest in our business; and return excess capital to shareholders whilst retaining a solid investment grade credit rating. Our guidance assumes ownership of our stake in PRH for all of 2017.
§ Direct Delivery: We will continue to reduce our exposure to large scale direct delivery services and focus on more scalable online, virtual, and blended services, across our portfolio. We are today announcing that Pearson has initiated processes to explore a potential partnership for our English language learning business Wall Street English (WSE) and the possible sale of our English test preparation business Global Education (GEDU). These processes are at an early stage and there is no certainty that they will lead to transactions. In 2016, these businesses contributed £253m of revenues and £3m of adjusted operating income. Our guidance assumes ownership of both for all of 2017.
§ Efficiency: We continue to manage our costs tightly. We will take further actions to improve the overall efficiency of the company and continue to realign our cost base to reflect the changing needs of our markets. We will update on our plans through the year.
o Preserving financial flexibility
§ Debt repayment: To ensure efficient use of the cash balances we held at 31 December 2016, we are today announcing that we will trigger the early repayment option on our $550m 6.25% Global Dollar bonds 2018.
§ Rebasing the dividend: As already communicated in January, we intend to recommend a final dividend of 34p for an overall 2016 dividend of 52p in line with our guidance, but as a result of the factors above we intend to rebase our dividend from 2017 onwards.


Pearson's chief executive John Fallon said:

"2016 was a challenging year for Pearson, but we remain the global leader in education, with a strong market position.

"Our priorities for 2017 are clear. We will continue to accelerate our digital transformation, simplify our portfolio, control our costs, and focus our investment on the biggest growth opportunities in education."


Pearson's results presentation for investors and analysts will be audiocast live today from 0900 (GMT) and
available for replay from 1200 (GMT) via www.pearson.com. High resolution photographs for the media are
available from our website www.pearson.com.

more.....

Pearson has been hit by a slowdown in its US higher education arm and has fallen into a loss of £2.3 billion – the biggest in its history.
The publisher was forced to write-down the value of its printed publishing business, hurt by lower college enrolment in North America and students choosing to rent rather than buy books.

Pearson expects full-year profits to come in just above the middle of its target range and guided to growth of 8-18% for 2019. The education and learning specialist reported said adjusted operating profit for 2018 would come in at around £540-545m, narrowing its range from the prior £520-560m.