DMGT sees pre-tax profits bounce

Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT), owner of Associated Newspapers and Euromoney, says profit increased 42% in the first half of the year.

The Daily Mail, The Metro and the Mail on Sunday
The Daily Mail, The Metro and the Mail on Sunday

Pre-tax profit rose to £110m for the six months ending 4 April. Revenue dropped 10% to £974m.

The figures come after a tough period for newspaper advertising revenues across the board.

But the company says that it is seeing “recovering advertising trends.” in its consumer businesses. It also said that it continued growth in B2B operations, including conferences.

Associated Newspapers, publisher of the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday and free newspaper Metro, saw operating profit rise 135% to £42m on revenue down 6% to £427m.

The division has been carrying out a programme of cost cutting and says that underlying ad revenues rose 1% to £181m, driven by a strong performance by Metro. Retail ad revenues, the publisher’s largest category, rose 18%. Digital revenues increased by 20%.

Martin Morgan, chief executive of DMGT, says: “Trading in the first half of the year was ahead of our expectations. Our UK consumer businesses have achieved sharp improvement in profitability reflecting the actions taken to reduce reduce costs and to eliminate loss-making activities, but also thanks to an improved advertising market.”

He adds that the company remained cautious, particularly in the UK, but felt that it was “increasingly well positioned to weather current economic uncertainties.”

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