Is Harry Potter director David Yates up for The Hobbit?

THE HOBBIT has sadly been plagued with setback after setback after setback in its epic quest to get to the silver screen. The latest of which of course was that the brilliant Guillermo del Toro would be walking away from the project (AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS por favor now, Memo?)

So the obvious question now has been: Who will take up the mantle?

According to /Film, after reviewing various industry tracking boards (private online sites that provide industry information), David Yates is supposedly WB’s top choice to helm THE HOBBIT. This indicates that, if nothing else, Warners is quite content with the last two POTTER films to be willing to hand the reins over to the relatively low-profile filmmaker. But as /Film points out, since there hasn’t been any sort of verification of this info, this should be taken as pure rumor (though I wouldn’t doubt that the guy’s name is somewhere in the running if not necessarily at the top).

Would Yates be a good choice? While THE HOBBIT and HARRY POTTER are obviously both large fantasy films with lots in common (fantastic characters, events, and effects) they’re both also very different kinds of fantasy. Would strong vision for one necessarily translate to the other?