INM sees ‘accelerated decline’ in print advertising revenue

Print advertising revenues at Independent News & Media showed an “accelerated decline” in the first four months of the year, the company said, leading to an overall fall in advertising income.

In a statement to the Irish Stock Exchange issued ahead of its annual meeting, INM said it had seen strong growth in digital advertising revenues, but this had not been enough to offset the drop in income from print.

The declining trend in circulation revenue remained “broadly unchanged”, it added.

“We believe, however, that INM continues to outperform the market in both advertising and circulation categories and continues to grow its market share,” the company said.

Overall group revenue in the four-month period to the end of April grew as a result of a better performance by its distribution business, Newspread.

INM, which counts the Irish Independent, the Sunday Independent, the Sunday World and the Herald among its titles, said it still anticipates that its pre-tax profits for the full year will be "within the range of market expectations".

The media group’s largest shareholder is Denis O’Brien, who also owns the national radio stations Today FM and Newstalk through his media group Communicorp.

INM chairman Leslie Buckley, a business associate of Mr O'Brien, was unable to attend the agm due to a leg injury and his prepared statement was read to investors by senior independent director Jerome Kennedy.

The group “continues its focus on cost management and has identified savings to offset the decline in print revenue”, he said.

“The challenging market conditions against which INM achieved a strong performance in 2015, have, as anticipated, continued into 2016 with the print advertising market experiencing ongoing volatility.”

INM chief executive Robert Pitt said the company was looking at cost savings “across the board” in a “severely challenged” market.

“We always have to be very clear that there are possibilities of redundancies as the business continues to change. We will always look to do those redundancies in a way where it is voluntary.”

He remained “positive on print”, but “the market has changed”, he said, citing the “serious declines” in print advertising reported last week by the Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT).

“We were very aware that this could happen, so we always had plans about what we would do to protect shareholder value, and we are doing that at the moment.”

Mr Pitt said it was not the case that big advertisers were moving away from print, but they were “looking for more complex solutions to reach their target customers”.

He reiterated that the group believed further consolidation in the industry was necessary for the sector to remain viable. “We have been very, very consistent in saying we see the need for consolidation.”

The group recently appointed Cormac McNulty, a veteran of HSBC and JP Morgan, as head of mergers and acquisitions (M&A). INM is “focused on the island of Ireland” for M&A targets, but is “looking at other markets as well”, Mr Pitt said.

The INM chief executive said he did not foresee a situation in three to five years’ time where it only printed newspapers some days of the week rather than daily.

“If we keep the quality of our papers at a level where people want to read them and want to buy them, we will still see demand for a paper.”