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Russian-born media tycoon Lord Evgeny Lebedev was forced to pledge further funding to help prop up the lossmaking Evening Standard before the move to axe its daily print edition this year, according to accounts filed at Companies House this week.
The accounts show that the newspaper’s shareholders have injected about £44mn in loans over the past two years — £23mn this year on top of a £21mn last year — while Lebedev has also provided a letter to the company promising to provide continued support if needed to allow the newspaper to meet its day-to-day working capital requirements.
The filings say that the company required “significant additional funding . . . to meet its liabilities as they fall due” even after the new loans. While the financial statements for the Evening Standard were prepared on a going concern basis, the company said there was still a “material uncertainty that may cast significant doubt on the company’s ability to continue as a going concern”.
Lebedev — who with his father Alexander, a former banker and ex-KGB agent, bought the Evening Standard in 2009 for just £1 — is the largest shareholder in the company, although a minority stake is held by Sultan Mohamed Abuljadayel, a Saudi-based investor. Lord Rothermere’s Daily Mail and General Trust also owns a small shareholding.
The accounts do not make it clear which shareholders have contributed to the loans. On October 1 2023, the amount due from the company to Lebedev was £9.8mn, up from £5.8mn the year before, while further loans of £272,000 were due to Daily Mail and General Holdings Limited. Lebedev received a peerage from Boris Johnson in 2020.
The latest results reveal the dire financial backdrop to a decision taken this year to replace its daily newspaper with a weekly edition, blaming working from home and the rollout of mobile services on the London Underground.
The newspaper suffered a pre-tax loss of £20.6mn in the 12 months to October 2023, rising from the £16.4mn loss in the same period the previous year. It blamed a structural decline in the advertising market, hitting both print and digital revenues. Revenue fell to £26.8mn, from £31.6mn the previous year.
The Evening Standard conducted a comprehensive review of its business operations at the end of last year, leading to the new digital strategy accompanied by a free weekly newspaper. A revamp of its website last year did not lead to an improvement in its financial performance, it said.
The newspaper, which has made about £100mn in losses over the past seven years, has announced plans for scores of job cuts in the newsroom. In an interview with the Financial Times earlier this year, Lebedev said that the move to kill the Evening Standard’s free daily print edition was “primarily, the shareholders’ decision . . . I really should have done it four years ago, but I didn’t . . . I tried, I tried, I tried, and it just didn’t stack up.”