The rumours appear to be true -- it's been a gloomy business week for Singapore Press Holdings (SPH), with its annual profit falling by 17.5 per cent, from $321.7 million a year earlier to $265.3 million.

It would have been worse, if not for the 4.6 per cent gain in its property segment.

Decline in almost every metric related to the media business

The overall revenue of SPH's media business declined $68.3 million to $834.2 million (a 7.6 per cent drop).

Advertising revenue fell $61.5 million (9.2 per cent) while circulation revenue fell $5.3 million (3 per cent).

The news giant also registered impairment charges of $28.4 million, primarily related to the magazine business.

The presence of an impairment charge, by the way, reflects that a company has invested too much resources into something that turned out, essentially, to be a bad decision — to put it crudely, a useless product.

Local tech and business news website Tech in Asia also noted that SPH's media revenue has declined four years in a row.

The only bright spot for SPH?

Its total costs declined for the third consecutive year.

SPH's operating expenditure fell $22.6 million (2.7 per cent), with SPH noting that this is a "result of the Group’s focus on cost discipline and operating efficiency".

Is this focus on "cost discipline and operating efficiency" a prelude to Deputy Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Patrick Daniel's rumoured town hall retrenchment restructuring announcement next week?

Top photo from AFP/Getty Images.

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