Trinity Mirror, the newspaper group, said today that the rate of decline in advertising revenues is beginning to slow, following a 25 per cent drop for the year to date.

The publisher, which owns the Daily Mirror and The Birmingham Post, said that advertising revenue had fallen 20 per cent in the 17 weeks to October 25, compared with the previous year. Advertising sales fell 28 per cent in the 26 weeks to June 28.

Nationals continued to outperform regional newspapers, with regionals falling 20 per cent in the last four months and nationals just 6 per cent.

Trinity Mirror has closed 27 titles in the last year and recently confirmed it was considering plans to turn some daily newspapers such as The Birmingham Post into weeklies. The group predicted an overall decline of 5 per cent in advertising revenues for November.

The figures follow similar updates on an improving advertising market from Johnston Press on Wednesday and from ITV last week. Shares in Trinity Mirror rose 0.1 per cent or 0.2p to 168.9p in early trading.

Total revenue for the group fell by 12 per cent, up 5 per cent from the declines experienced in the first half of the year. Group circulation has fallen 4 per cent in the year to date.

In a trading statement, the group said that they remained on track to deliver structural cost savings of £35 million. Net debt has fallen by a further £16 million during the period. They predicted that capital expenditure would be some £5 million below the £25 million previously announced to the market.

The statement gave no further details on the closure of Trinity Mirror’s final-salary pension schemes to existing members. The group says that it can no longer afford the scheme, once famously plundered for £500 million by the former proprietor Robert Maxwell, and has entered into a two-month consultation with staff.

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