Trinity Mirror's chief executive has attributed a profits fall of 12.8 per cent to the weak advertising market in the first half of 2006.

The UK's largest publisher of regional papers, and owner of the Daily Mirror, saw pre-tax profits fall in the first half of this year to £98.1 million.

In the same period last year Trinity Mirror's profits stood at £112.5 million.

Revenues were down 2.2 per cent, compared with the first half of 2005, to £566.6 million.

Chief executive Sly Bailey said in her statement: "Our results should be viewed in the context of a weak advertising environment with falling GDP growth, sluggish consumer spending and rising unemployment.

"These market conditions are impacting all advertising categories with the exception of property advertising, where we continue to achieve marginal growth despite very tough comparables for 2005."

In May the company purchased Email4Property, an estate agent directory for £4.4m.

Email4Property operates nearly 2,000 property websites promoting local estate agents in UK towns and cities.

The move was inline with other traditional newspaper publishers buying into the internet to make up for lost advertising revenues in print.

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