CURRENT ACCOUNT: The latest circulation figures for the UK daily and Sunday papers make grim reading for Independent News & Media. Sales of the Independent and the Independent on Sunday fell by 5.46 per cent and 4.48 per cent respectively over the 12 months to the end of December. The latest circulation figures for the UK daily and Sunday papers make grim reading for Independent News & Media. Sales of the Independent and the Independent on Sunday fell by 5.46 per cent and 4.48 per cent respectively over the 12 months to the end of December.
The only broadsheet to turn in a worse performance was the Financial Times, which saw circulation fall by 6.4 per cent.
It is hardly good news, but presumably these trends were apparent to the group when it issued its pre-close trading statement saying that it expected to meet market expectations of profits between €14 and €18.5 million for 2002. Tight cost control and improved trading - elsewhere in the group presumably - helped underpin profits in the second half.
And as Goodbody - one of Independent's three Irish stockbrokers points out - the increase in the cover prices of the two titles should compensate for the fall in sales.
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