Seemingly possessing the strength of its pantheon of super heroes, Marvel Entertainment is bucking the trend of reporting less-than-stellar year-end results, recording healthy net sales and net income for Q4 2008 and for the full year.

In the fourth quarter, Marvel saw a significant spike in net sales to US$224.3 million (with a net income of US$63 million) from net sales of US$109.3 million and net income of US$27.6 million for the same period in 2007. The increase is attributed to the US$135.5 million in film production segment revenues largely driven by Iron Man DVD sales.

As for the full year 2008, the company also saw a rise in net sales to US$676.2 million, up from US$485.8 million the previous year, as well as a healthy bump in net income to US$205.5 million from US$139.8 million in 2007. Growth in these areas for the year primarily come from Marvel Studios, which released Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk on the big screen last summer.

On the consumer products side, total licensing segment sales were down to US$292.8 million for the 12 months ending December 31, 2008, as compared to the previous year at US$343.6 million. Domestic consumer products, however, saw a slight increase, rising to US$125.6 million from US$110.2 million in 2007, which includes its global interactive licensing business. International consumer products were also up to US$85.9 million from US$74.3 million in 2007. Not surprisingly, the absence of a new Spider-Man film accounted for the largest decline in the CP sector with both domestic and international licensing revenues from its joint-venture with Sony, Spider-Man L.P., dipping to US$57.4 million from US$122 million in the same period last year, as a drop in studio licensing from US$37.1 million last year to US$23.9 million in 2008.