Staff at the Rupert Murdoch owned Dublin headquartered social media intelligence and online news agency, Storyful have shared bonus payments of €1.134 million over the past two years.
New accounts show that staff at the slimmed down Storyful Ltd shared ‘staff bonus’ of €581,415 in the 12 months to the end of June last and this followed a payout of €553,339 under the same heading in 2021.
The News Corporation owned Storyful Ltd accounts show that pre-tax losses at the business last year narrowed by 41 per cent to €3.968 million.
The business reduced its losses as revenues dipped marginally from €4.57 million to €4.48 million in the 12 months to the end of June last.
The firm implemented restructuring in fiscal 2021 and the new accounts show that the numbers employed at the Irish unit reduced from 89 to 62 last year as staff costs reduced from €7.05 million to €5.6 million that included the 'staff bonus'.
Not all of Storyful’s global revenues are included in the results and relate only to the Irish based entity, Storyful Ltd.
The pre-tax losses of €3.96 million last year were down €2.8 million from the pre-tax losses of €6.77m incurred in the prior year.
The firm’s administrative expenses reduced from €9.27 million to €6.37 million and the directors state that “these expenses continued to be tightly controlled and are driven primarily by payroll costs and amortisation”.
The business last year recorded the pre-tax losses after booking combined non-cash depreciation and amortisation costs of €1.1 million.
The loss also takes into account a loss of €519,653 on the sale of an asset and a €191,655 loss in exchange differences. The firm also incurred €437,079 in operating lease costs.
The firm did benefit from an R&D tax credit of €112,632 and a €114,986 gain on a lease retirement.
The accounts show that the numbers in editorial reduced from 42 to 31; from 27 to 16 in technology and development; from 16 to 11 in general and administration while numbers in sales and marketing remained at four.
Former RTE Primetime presenter, Mark Little set up the company in 2010 and Mr Little and the company’s investors sold it to News Corp for €18m in December 2013.
A note attached to the accounts state that the directors have considered the losses to date and report that they are satisfied that appropriate measures have been taken to bring about the company’s profitability.
They state that the funding provided by the shareholder is sufficient to enable the company to meet its obligations as they fall due.
Salaries and fees to directors last year increased from €530,505 to €620,378.
The accounts disclose that in a post balance sheet in December last, the company issued 3,000 ordinary shares for €3m.
The firm's accumulated losses of €52.7m were offset by share premium account of €56m and called up share capital of €389,075 resulting in shareholders’ funds of €3.65m at the end of June 2022.
