INM swings back into the black

IRELAND’s largest media group Independent News & Media (INM), swung back into profit — on a pre-tax level — last year, and is hoping to resume making dividend payments to shareholders next year.

The group generated a pre-tax profit of €4.6 million in 2010, up from a loss of €104.3m in 2009. Last year’s results, which were published yesterday, also showed a 14% rise in operating profit to €87.9m and a 3.3% increase in group revenue to €605.3m. INM’s net debt was also reduced by 17.5% — or just over €100m — to €473.6m. Earnings per share amounted to 10.6c; up from a loss per share of 39.8c in the previous year.

Chief executive Gavin O’Reilly said macroeconomic conditions in Ireland remained “subdued”. INM’s advertising revenues — which comprise 41% of group revenue — remained negative last year and are currently down 7% in the year-to-date. He said the group has been firmly re-positioned for growth; having disposed of non-core assets, including its two loss-making London newspaper titles.

Mr O’Reilly added that last year had been “hugely significant for INM”, following “an extremely difficult” 2009; adding that all of the group’s divisions grew profit and underlying operating costs were reduced by 3.6%.

On the latter note, he said cost management would continue to be a focus this year and that net debt reduction would continue. However, he said this would probably not entail any further job losses or subsidiary disposals. “There won’t be any big knives coming out; most of our major step changes have been implemented. We’ll continue to focus on doing what we do — namely driving profit.”

Mr O’Reilly said that while no material uplift in advertising conditions is expected this year; some normalisation in that regard, coupled with the effect of the disposal of loss-making assets, should result in further improvement in group operating profit in 2011.

INM has also announced a number of online investments, coming to less than €1m, including a new online jobs portal, an online coupon service called ‘GrabOne.ie’, and a 50% shareholding in Irish car sales website, carsireland.ie.

The group has also named former Sunday Tribune editor Noirin Hegarty as editor of independent.ie.