£49 Million Loss For Dead Tree Publisher
Apparently this is, "disappointing". More Corporo-quotes of the week here.
"How much?!", a piece of shocked dead tree, today.
We were aware that dead-tree publishing is living in troubled times. This is especially true when it comes to the videogame sector. Readers are choosing to eschew magazines as they can now get pretty much all the information, news, previews, reviews and free demos from the Internet.
However, when a Bath-based dead-tree publishing company declares a shocking £49 million loss for the sales year ending 30th September 2006, even SPOnG has to escalate the phrase, “troubled” to “potentially apocalyptic”.
The bulk of the loss comes from what the passionate organisation calls, “an impairment charge of £45.0m against the carrying value of the intangible assets relating to the Group’s UK, US and Italian subsidiaries to reflect more accurately the trading levels of these businesses.”
Investopedia says this about ‘impairment charges’:
So, now you know.
The company also announced the sale of its Future Media Italy to management for €1.1-million in cash.
CEO of the Bath-based company, Stevie Sprint, says of the horrendous profit loss, "It is clear with hindsight that during the past two years, Future over-invested in acquisitions and under-invested in organic development… The consequences of this strategy are clearly evident in today’s disappointing results, with underlying profits down by a third and some significant exceptional charges and write offs."
Spring adds that she anticipates “…that 2007 will be a year of transition as we evolve our business models to reflect changing consumer, advertiser and retailer behaviour, and ensure we have a more focused and responsive group"
OK, to kick off SPOnG’s new “What The?!” feature - we are proud to offer a copy of Graham Edwards masterful book, Bullshit Bingo to the best translation of the above Corporo-speak. Post your translation into real English on the forum. The winner will be judged by us.
However, when a Bath-based dead-tree publishing company declares a shocking £49 million loss for the sales year ending 30th September 2006, even SPOnG has to escalate the phrase, “troubled” to “potentially apocalyptic”.
The bulk of the loss comes from what the passionate organisation calls, “an impairment charge of £45.0m against the carrying value of the intangible assets relating to the Group’s UK, US and Italian subsidiaries to reflect more accurately the trading levels of these businesses.”
Investopedia says this about ‘impairment charges’:
"Impairment charge" is the new term for writing off worthless goodwill. These charges started making headlines in 2002 as companies adopted new accounting rules and disclosed huge goodwill write-offs (for example, AOL - $54 billion, SBC - $1.8 billion, and McDonald's - $99 million).”
So, now you know.
The company also announced the sale of its Future Media Italy to management for €1.1-million in cash.
CEO of the Bath-based company, Stevie Sprint, says of the horrendous profit loss, "It is clear with hindsight that during the past two years, Future over-invested in acquisitions and under-invested in organic development… The consequences of this strategy are clearly evident in today’s disappointing results, with underlying profits down by a third and some significant exceptional charges and write offs."
Spring adds that she anticipates “…that 2007 will be a year of transition as we evolve our business models to reflect changing consumer, advertiser and retailer behaviour, and ensure we have a more focused and responsive group"
OK, to kick off SPOnG’s new “What The?!” feature - we are proud to offer a copy of Graham Edwards masterful book, Bullshit Bingo to the best translation of the above Corporo-speak. Post your translation into real English on the forum. The winner will be judged by us.
Comments
Mecha Ghandi 29 Nov 2006 12:18
1/3
CEO of the Bath-based company, Stevie Sprint, says of the horrendous profit loss, "Oops. We didn’t see this coming. We spent 2 years squandering money in an ill-advised attempt to monopolise a shrinking market (like what Simon Woodroffe told us to do in his 'how to be really successful in business' conference), and so we forgot to buy carrot/brussel-sprout seeds for our allotment (like Hugh Funky-Whittingstall told us to). Now it’s all buggered up because we don’t have any money left and we’re all really hungry. And we’ve still got loads of outstanding parking fines from that time we parked a tank on a double red line outside a smaller publishers’ offices."
Spring adds that he anticipates “…2007 will be a year of transition as we struggle to stay afloat by auctioning off special edition promo games on ebay and pimping our own asses to anyone with a passing interest in ass. And by firing most of our employees, the 3 people left will be more focused and responsive: otherwise we’ll fire them too. Now please excuse me for a minute, I'm off to check the Aardvark Swift website"
Spring adds that he anticipates “…2007 will be a year of transition as we struggle to stay afloat by auctioning off special edition promo games on ebay and pimping our own asses to anyone with a passing interest in ass. And by firing most of our employees, the 3 people left will be more focused and responsive: otherwise we’ll fire them too. Now please excuse me for a minute, I'm off to check the Aardvark Swift website"
SPInGSPOnG 29 Nov 2006 12:44
2/3
Futile wrote:
an impairment charge of £45.0m against the carrying value of the intangible assets relating to the Group’s UK, US and Italian subsidiaries to reflect more accurately the trading levels of these businesses
Sounds to me like they mean, "We fleeced our investors and falsely inflated our share price by ridiculously overstating the value of our company, but for some reason, the SEC took exception to it."
PresidentEvil 29 Nov 2006 13:02
3/3
Lying about the value of the company to shareholders is an important part of modern capitalism. Shareholders want their shares to go up in value like one of those rocket things that that pinko Kennedy pretended to send to the moon. But it doesn't always work like that... people say they want the truth, but they can't handle the truth.
Sometimes, instead of spending little old ladies retirement funds on organic growth through socially responsible means, CEOs might accidentally spunk it all away on coke and whores. This could lead to a crisis of shareholder confidence. It is important that this is avoided, or some rich people might lose money - and that's just not what the sweet little baby Jesus' Dad would have wanted. He told me so!
Sometimes, instead of spending little old ladies retirement funds on organic growth through socially responsible means, CEOs might accidentally spunk it all away on coke and whores. This could lead to a crisis of shareholder confidence. It is important that this is avoided, or some rich people might lose money - and that's just not what the sweet little baby Jesus' Dad would have wanted. He told me so!