Daily Mail owner makes the web pay

Daily Mail and General Trust said digital advertising revenue at its MailOnline site grew 59 per cent in the five months to end-February, offsetting an 8 per cent decline in advertising at its print titles.

By The Newsroom

Published 26th Mar 2013, 00:01 BST

MailOnline attracted 111 million unique browsers in February, the group said, 22 per cent up on a year ago.

The site was expected to generate revenue of about £3.4m in March, and full-year revenue of about £45m.

The company, which publishes the Daily Mail and The Mail on Sunday newspapers, said underlying revenue for the five-month period grew 2 per cent, helped by a solid performance from its business-to-business operations.

Revenue at its newspaper and website unit fell 2 per cent as a 6 per cent drop in circulation revenue was only partly offset by 1 per cent growth in advertising, it said.

Analysts at Liberum Capital downgraded their recommendation from ‘buy’ to ‘hold’.

“The re-rating of the stock has been deserved with its shift from a newspaper group to a mainly B2B business,” they said.