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While the financial success of the upcoming film Twilight is yet to be assured, it appears that the studio is already itching to get the sequel rolling. “New Moon,” the second in a set of three books by author Stephenie Meyer, is rumored to already be in the planning stages, and could hit theaters as soon as December 2009.

Our friends over at Shock Till You Drop are reporting that Summit Entertainment, the studio behind the December 12 release of Twilight, has already optioned “New Moon” for adaptation.

This is all contingent on the success of the first film of course, which was made on a decidedly low budget of $30-$35 million. We can only assume, based on the response we have seen thus far online that Twilight is going to turn a quick profit, leading to a green light for it’s sequel. And as producer Wyck Godfrey told Shock back in March, they would like to have the next film begin production by early next year:

“The goal is, we’ve got the [sequel] script ready to go and come December we want to shoot it for about the same time – for the weather and stuff we don’t want to be in the heat of the winter. Obviously, you know the next book and know we can go out into the sun a little bit more. Hopefully, we’ll have it ready to go and ready to start prepping for the beginning of next year.”

There is still no word as to whether director Catherine Hardwicke (Lords of Dogtown, Thirteen) would continue on with the series, nor has the studio acknowledged any of these plans — it is all just rumor and speculation at this point, our favorite kind of news.

“New Moon” continues the love story between a vampire named Edward that doesn’t age (Robert Pattinson) and a human, Bella (Kristen Stewart). Twilight is in theaters December 12, 2008.

Do you think that Twilight will do the kind of business that will warrant a sequel?