Profits at O’Connell’s firm top €1m

Paul O’Connell, who captained Ireland to Six Nations glory last weekend, has even more reason to celebrate with new accounts showing his firm’s accumulated profits have topped €1m for the first time.

Accounts filed to the Companies Office by Nellcon Ltd, for the 12 months to April 30, 2013, show its accumulated profits rose from €975,311 to €1.09m. The cash pile at the firm increased by €38,901 to €1.051m.

O’Connell, 34, has been a talisman for Munster and Ireland over the past decade.

In January, the second row — capped 92 times by Ireland — ensured his present level of basic income will continue when he signed a new Ireland international rugby contract that will see him play for Ireland and Munster until the summer of 2016.

O’Connell will celebrate 13 years of playing with Munster in August, turning out for the province more than 150 times over the years.

O’Connell has benefited from his professional playing career coinciding with a boom in the finances of the IRFU through the growing popularity of rugby here — between 2001 and 2013, revenues at the union, which controls 80% of the finances of Irish rugby, have trebled from €21.6m to €64m.

At the end of his playing career, O’Connell — like other key sportsmen who end their playing careers in Ireland — will be able to claim back 40% of the tax they paid over a 10-year period under a government scheme introduced in 2002.

O’Connell — who married Emily O’Leary last June — also added to his coffers last year when taking on the role of brand ambassador for electricity firm, Pinergy.

The figures for Nellcon Ltd show that at the end of April, the company owed €38,213 to O’Connell.

The value of the firm’s investments totalled €5,000 last year, while debtors totalled €112,860.

O’Connell established Nellcon in 2005, and the figures show that the firm’s net assets were valued at €1.091m at the end of April.