National Book Store issued this official statement to the media:

“National Book Store is happy to have been partners with Scholastic through the years in providing quality books to Filipino readers. We are very honored to have been granted exclusive distribution rights of ‘Harry Potter and the Cursed Child – Parts One & Two (Special Rehearsal Edition Script)’ in the Philippines. It has been an undertaking to be able to distribute the book to all our 205 stores nationwide in time for the worldwide release on July 31, 2016, at 7:01 am, and we are delighted to have provided thousands of Harry Potter fans an opportunity to read the book.

Historically, we have always endeavored to keep pricing in line with the cover price of a particular title, despite the difficulties of distribution throughout our widespread archipelago. We find ourselves in a unique situation where an English-language book sourced from the United Kingdom is cheaper than the same title sourced from the United States, because of the massive recent devaluation of the British Pound. However, in the publishing world, exclusive distribution rights of English-language books in a particular country, including the Philippines, are assigned by the author. In our country such distribution rights are traditionally assigned to US publishers. We are ethically and legally bound to honor the territorial rights of our long time partners such as Scholastic US.

The actions taken by one of our competitors in bringing in unauthorized copies of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child – Parts One & Two (Special Rehearsal Edition Script) have compelled us to explore all legal and commercial remedies to protect our rights within Philippine and international law.

We thank all our customers for their loyalty and patronage.”