Justin Bieber album Believe scores huge US debut

Justin Bieber has scored the highest first week sales of any album in the US so far this year.

The 18-year-old singer's record Believe sold 374,000 copies in its first seven days, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

It's the Canadian's fourth number one album in the States following My World 2.0, Never Say Never: The Remixes and Under The Mistletoe.

However, it did fall short of midweek predictions which expected the album to sell between 410,000 and 440,000.

His sales still topped Madonna whose album MDNA sold 359,000 copies in its first week on release earlier this year.

It also marks a personal record for the singer.

His previous chart best was with My World 2.0 which sold 291,000 in its first week in April 2010.

The biggest sales for an album in the US in 2012 is still Adele's 21, which sold 730,000 copies in the week following her victories at The Grammys in February.

Justin Bieber is currently number one in the UK's official album chart too, where he beat off competition from Cheryl Cole.