A disappointing holiday season was a big factor in driving down the stock price of Barnes & Noble in January as its share price fell 11.6% in the month, the largest decline of stocks on the Publishers Weekly Stock Index. January was not a good month for the other bricks-and-mortar stores on the PWSI as Books-A-Million's share price fell 9.0% and hasting Entertainment's stock declined 1.4%. In contrast, Amazon's stock price jumped by almost $15 in the month even as investors and analysts debated whether the fact that the company generated $61 billion in revenue in 2012 but still lost a small amount of money is good or bad. The biggest gain in the month came from Courier Corp., whose stock fell 9.3% in 2012, but, helped by an encouraging quarterly report, posted a 13.6% increase in its share price last month. Overall, the stock prices of eight companies on the PWSI rose, while five fell. McGraw-Hill has been dropped since its pending sale of McGraw-Hill Education will knock it out of publishing.
| Winners | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Company | Dec. 31, 2012 | Jan. 31, 2013 | % Change |
| Courier Corp. | 10.66 | 12.11 | 13.6% |
| CBS | 36.85 | 41.72 | 13.2 |
| Walt Disney | 49.79 | 53.88 | 8.2 |
| Amazon | 250.87 | 265.50 | 5.8 |
| Educational Dev. Corp. | 3.81 | 3.95 | 3.7 |
| Losers | |||
| Barnes & Noble | 15.09 | 13.34 | -11.6 |
| Books-A-Million | 2.66 | 2.42 | -9.0 |
| Pearson | 19.54 | 18.98 | -2.9 |
| John Wiley | 38.93 | 38.30 | -1.6 |
| Hastings Ent. | 2.20 | 2.17 | -14.0 |
| PW Stock Index | 510.99 | 534.74 | 4.6 |
| Dow Jones Aver. | 13,104.14 | 13,860.58 | 5.8 |
