Currency key for many at FBF '16

Publishers and agents haggled over the currency book deals would be struck in at Frankfurt, as the falling value of sterling became a factor in whether deals were concluded in euros or US dollars rather than sterling.

Agent Lorella Belli said that she found foreign publishers were “very happy” to buy books in sterling, as the weak pound makes them relatively inexpensive, and noticed that “more people are asking to do deals in sterling where you would have done deals in euros before”. However, agents wanted to sell books in the stronger (euro) currency, Belli added. “It is a really big difference if you are changing money—over 10%. It’s not a deal breaker, but it can be a big difference if it’s an advance.”

Agent Catherine Clarke at Felicity Bryan said that with the weaker post-EU referendum pound, doing deals in the more stable euro or dollar has been beneficial to UK authors, reporting “plenty of business in those currencies”.

Fellow agent Diane Banks agreed that the falling value of the pound has been “great” for foreign-rights business: “As our deals are in euros and dollars, it means that our authors have received windfalls”.

But Caroline de la Bédoyère, director of Search Press, said her company had been very conscious of striking deals in non-sterling currencies since the Brexit vote. “It is dangerous when sterling is so volatile at the moment,” she noted.

Mitch Albert, publisher and commissioning editor at Periscope, an imprint of Garnet Publishing, said: “We’re a small, scrappy independent press, so deals costing more might translate into us walking away [from the acquisition].”

At Scholastic, m.d. Catherine Bell said: “We are managing our negotiations to mitigate any currency impact as far as possible... Most of our rights customers offered in euros before Brexit, and have continued to do so now.”

Meanwhile, at Thames & Hudson c.e.o. Rolf Grisebach said: “We are doing deals in euros, dollars and pounds. There is not one solution to this challenge and we see different priorities and philosophies from different partners: the currency is not the dominating topic when it comes to agreeing a deal.”

De la Bédoyère also noted that the general price of being at the Frankfurt Book Fair had tangibly increased. “Just being [at the fair] is so much more expensive,” she said. “We’ve put 20% on [in terms of ] the cost of the people coming; it costs us so much more to pay our hotel bill, pay everything.”