Another big financial loss for Media24

MEDIA24 notched up another hefty trading loss in financial 2018 as it continued to plough money into digital media and e-commerce operations while having to contend with the structural decline in its mature print media businesses.

Media24, the single largest media group in the country, is wholly owned by Naspers and reported a fall in turnover to R4.7-billion from R4.9-billion.

But costs of over R5-billion left an operating loss of R373-million, up from R356-million in the 12 months to end-March 2017. The trading loss of about $30-million is in the context of Naspers’s $11.3billion profit for the year.

Vestact chief executive Paul Theron said that Media24 was in danger of being just a “rounding error” for Naspers.

Media24 does not reveal the sources of the operating losses and does not provide a detailed breakdown of the “costs of providing services and sale of goods” or of the “selling, general and administration expenses”.

But chief executive Esmare Weideman referred to “strong results” delivered by Media24’s print media division, “with our newspapers benefiting from solid retail advertising and cost efficiencies boosting profitability”.

Weideman said Media24’s newspapers and magazines “maintained their leading position in circulation and advertising market share”.