GB News reports 40% jump in loss as audience numbers increase

GB News’s losses ballooned by nearly 40% last year as its owners continued to pour millions of pounds into the broadcaster.

The company said that its audience figures had ballooned, especially online where page fields increased more than fivefold.

GB News said that its pre-tax loss had gone from £30.7 million in the year to the end of May 2022, to £42.4 million a year later.

Despite almost doubling, the company’s revenue was still considerably lower than its losses, reaching £6.7 million.

Last year GB News got £41.0 million from the parent company, taking the total it now owes it to £83.8 million.

“The company has strong support from its investors and the directors have no reason to believe that the level of these contributions might vary to a significant degree or be recalled before the group has the resources to repay the investment,” GB News said in accounts filed to Companies House.

The business said that it had an average of 295 monthly employees during the year, with its wage, social security and pension costs reaching £21.2 million, or around £72,000 per head.

The business, which said it committed to “promoting diversity and inclusion in the workplace,” had employed an average of 175 people a year earlier.

The business said that it reached an average of 2.7 million viewers per month in the year ending May 2023, up 17.8% on the year before. Its average share of linear TV was 0.45%, up from 0.30% a year earlier. It cited viewing figures from Barb Audiences.

In the company’s digital presence page views rose 431% to 51.9 million, GB News said.

The company made £5.4 million of its revenue from the UK, while £1.3 million of it came from the rest of the world. Ad revenue rose 41.4% to £4.2 million, with digital revenue increasing around fourfold to £2.2 million.