Pearson has said that the Financial Times faced a "weak" advertising market in the first quarter of this year, but nevertheless managed to increase its digital subscriptions by 4% on the first quarter to 328,000, while Penguin has had a good start with strong sellers from authors including Jamie Oliver and Nora Roberts.

Overall, Pearson said total group revenues fell 1% year on year on an underlying basis to £1.2bn in the first quarter.

Pearson, which owns an international education business and book publisher Penguin, said the FT has been hit by the fact that a number of large advertising campaigns have been planned for the second quarter compared with last year, when they ran in the first three months.

The company, which is proposing a final dividend of 30p at its annual general meeting to be held on Friday, said that despite the weak trading conditions, the FT was "benefiting from resilient demand for content and services". The FT has a global paid and digital circulation of 602,000.

Pearson said Penguin, which is being merged with rival Random House, has had a good start with bestsellers from Harlan Coben, Nora Roberts, Jamie Oliver and John Green.

The company said that in its education operation, conditions remain generally weak in developed markets and stronger in emerging markets.

Pearson said it expects operating profits in the first six months to be down on the same period last year, but noted that the nature of its business is that revenue is "heavily weighted" to the second half of the year.

The company said that it has about £500m available to invest in "bolt-on" acquisitions this year.

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