FT on course to cut losses as advertising revenues rise

by Staff,, Brand Republic 10-Nov-04, 08:45

LONDON – The Financial Times is set to reduce losses by around £20m, which could include the axing of its Creative Business supplement, as advertising revenues at the paper rose by 2%.

In a trading statement for the first nine months of the year, Pearson said that sales at the FT Group are up 6% and it expects a significant profit improvement for the full year.

The FT is on track to reduce losses by approximately £20m this year, and owner Pearson said it expects the newspaper to return to breakeven in the fourth quarter.

"Though advertising trends remain erratic from week to week and across industry sectors, advertising revenues are ahead of last year at all our business newspapers.

"At the Financial Times, advertising revenues are 2% higher and forward bookings are slightly ahead," Pearson said in its statement.

Sector by sector, the FT is seeing recruitment and luxury goods advertising revenues grow by over 20%, but technology and business-to-business advertising remain weak.

Yesterday, the FT confirmed it is considering the future of its weekly media supplement Creative Business, but has denied that it has already decided to close it.

The 16-page supplement has struggled to bring in advertising and this week's issue, even with the editorial draw of the Top 50 Creative Businesspeople, features just three-and-a-half pages of display ads.

A spokesperson for the FT said: "We are looking at Creative Business as part of our annual budgeting process. We have absolutely not taken any decision to close it. It may stay. We are looking at the format but I'm not going to comment on what we might change."

If the format is to be changed, this is likely to mean that the supplement would be trimmed to eight pages, or converted to pages appearing within the main paper.

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