Kurier Redaktionsgesellschaft

Reading note: This filing covers the editorial operating subsidiary only, not the KURIER group. Revenue figures are not comparable year-on-year without adjustment for the marketing services transfer that took effect 1 July 2024. See Signals for full explanation.

The annual financial statements of Kurier Redaktionsgesellschaft m.b.H. & Co. KG for the financial year ended 30 June 2025 show revenue of EUR 24.9 million, a pre-tax profit of EUR 529,065, and an average workforce of 197 employees, down from 245 the prior year. These figures, filed with the Austrian Firmenbuch in December 2025, describe only the editorial operating entity within the wider KURIER media group; they do not represent the consolidated financial position of the newspaper or the group. The parent company, Kurier Zeitungsverlag und Druckerei Gesellschaft m.b.H. (FN 107826v), prepares the consolidated group accounts separately, as stated in the filing’s notes. Taken in context, the filing reveals the financial effect of a sharp reduction in the editorial workforce compared with the prior year, the structural dependence of the newsroom on provisions covering severance and pensions, and, in a single overlooked note, a EUR 2.8 million equity injection from the parent.

Kurier Redaktionsgesellschaft: Key Financial Indicators, FY2023/24 vs FY2024/25

Source: Kurier Redaktionsgesellschaft m.b.H. & Co. Kommanditgesellschaft, Jahresabschluss zum 30.06.2025, FN 008289s, filed with Firmenbuch (Handelsgericht Wien), prepared 4 December 2025, PDF generated 30 March 2026. Financial year runs 1 July to 30 June. Prior-year figures presented in thousands (TEUR) in the original filing; converted here to full EUR for comparability. Personnel costs and operating result prior-year figures are rounded as presented in the original. Change calculations based on rounded prior-year TEUR figures.

Kurier Redaktionsgesellschaft m.b.H. & Co. KG is a 100%-owned subsidiary of Kurier Zeitungsverlag und Druckerei Gesellschaft m.b.H., based in Vienna. The notes state that the parent prepares the consolidated group accounts (Konzernabschluss) for both the widest and the smallest circle of companies, deposited with the commercial court (Firmenbuch) under FN 107826v. All revenues reported in this subsidiary filing are domestic (Inlandsumsätze exclusively). Intercompany transactions are stated to be at market terms (marktübliche Konditionen).

The following group context and asset overview draws on external sources, Firmenbuch records, published legal impressum disclosures, and decisions of the Austrian Federal Competition Authority (Bundeswettbewerbsbehörde), and is presented separately from the filing-based analysis above.

What the KURIER Group Owns

Note: The asset map draws on: Firmenbuch FN 107826v (parent company registration); published legal impressum disclosures at profil.at and kurieranzeigen.at; and the Bundeswettbewerbsbehörde published decision on the Raiffeisen-Holding NÖ-Wien / Niederösterreichisches Pressehaus merger (8 July 2024).

Signals

The 21.5% revenue decline is almost entirely a structural reclassification, not a trading loss

The most prominent figure in this filing, revenue falling from EUR 31.7 million to EUR 24.9 million, will be misread by any analyst who does not read the notes. Note E.1 (Erläuterungen zur Gewinn- und Verlustrechnung) states explicitly that marketing services (Marketingleistungen) have been handled by the parent company KURIER Zeitungsverlag und Druckerei Gesellschaft m.b.H. since 1 July 2024. In the prior year, the editorial subsidiary billed EUR 4.9 million in marketing services. In 2024/25 that line is zero. Additionally, ‘other services’ (sonstige Leistungserlöse) fell by EUR 2.7 million, from EUR 5.75 million to EUR 3.04 million, a category that includes lottery and gaming-related revenues alongside other ancillary income. These two lines together account for approximately EUR 7.6 million of the EUR 6.8 million revenue decline.

The underlying editorial services revenue, the line that directly measures what the newsroom bills for its journalism, rose 3.7%, from EUR 21.1 million to EUR 21.8 million. That is the number that matters for assessing editorial capacity, and it moved in the right direction. The filing therefore shows a reorganisation of where revenue is booked within the group, not a deterioration in editorial billings.

The newsroom lost nearly one in five employees

The average headcount of the editorial subsidiary fell from 245 to 197 during FY2024/25, a reduction of 48 employees or 19.6%. The filing captures the financial effect of this sharp year-on-year workforce reduction but does not itself describe the circumstances or timing of individual departures. Personnel costs fell from approximately EUR 24.3 million to EUR 19.6 million, a reduction of 19.3% that is broadly proportionate to the headcount reduction.

Personnel costs as a share of editorial services revenue rose from approximately 76.7% to 78.8%, because the marketing revenue that previously offset the cost base has been transferred to the parent. The editorial subsidiary is almost entirely a labour cost entity: with revenue of EUR 24.9 million and personnel costs of EUR 19.6 million, there is very limited margin before the operating result approaches zero. The operating result of EUR 153,384 on EUR 24.9 million in revenue represents a margin of 0.6%. The entity’s stability clearly depends on its role within the wider KURIER group rather than on any meaningful standalone profitability.

The parent injected EUR 2.8 million in fresh equity

Kurier Zeitungsverlag und Druckerei Gesellschaft m.b.H. approved, via internal circular resolution 75/2025, a shareholder equity injection (Gesellschafterzuschuss) of EUR 2,800,000 into the editorial subsidiary. The filing states the purpose as ‘Stärkung der Eigenkapitalbasis’, strengthening the equity base. No further explanation is given in the accounts.

As a point of scale, EUR 2.8 million represents approximately 13.2% of the subsidiary’s total assets of EUR 21.17 million. One caveat on tracing this through the accounts: the year-end equity rose from EUR 4,781,024 to EUR 4,892,906, an increase of only EUR 111,882, far less than the disclosed injection. The injection is disclosed in the notes but its net effect on the balance sheet cannot be cleanly isolated from the available information. One plausible inference is that the injection was needed to offset balance-sheet pressure from the large provisions drawdown and the overall contraction of total assets, but this is an inference and not a conclusion the filing itself supports.

Ownership context: Raiffeisen majority, Funke minority

The editorial subsidiary is 100%-owned by Kurier Zeitungsverlag und Druckerei Gesellschaft m.b.H. According to published impressum data (profil.at, kurieranzeigen.at) and Firmenbuch FN 107826v, the parent company is majority-controlled (50.56%) by Raiffeisen-linked structures through Printmedien Beteiligungsges.m.b.H. and Medicur-Holding GmbH, in which Raiffeisen-Holding NÖ-Wien and Raiffeisen Bank International AG hold indirect interests. The remaining 49.44% is held by WAZ Ausland Holding GmbH, the vehicle through which German media group Funke Mediengruppe holds its Austrian interests.

According to industry reporting current as of June 2025 (diemedien.at), Raiffeisen was in active negotiations to acquire Funke’s stake. That transaction had not closed as of the filing date of December 2025. According to the same published impressum disclosures, the supervisory board of the management entity Kurier Redaktionsgesellschaft m.b.H. is chaired by Erwin Hameseder, a senior figure in the Raiffeisen federation. This interlocking structure is directly relevant to assessments of editorial independence.

According to published industry reporting (new-business.de, April 2025), Funke Mediengruppe’s central editorial operation in Berlin began supplying Kurier with journalistic content from 1 April 2025, covering politics, economics, features and service sections in both print and online editions.

According to Firmenbuch records, published impressum data, and the Bundeswettbewerbsbehörde decision of 8 July 2024, Kurier Zeitungsverlag und Druckerei Gesellschaft m.b.H. holds a 50% equity stake in Mediaprint Zeitungs- und Zeitschriftenverlag GmbH & Co KG, jointly with Kronen Zeitung. Profits are allocated under a fixed 70/30 contractual key (Krone to Kurier) based on the Kommanditanteile rather than the 50/50 equity ownership. Mediaprint is the dominant newspaper printer and distributor in eastern Austria.

State aid to the parent: EUR 4.09 million in 2024, further tranches in 2025

A dimension of Kurier’s financial position that does not appear in the editorial subsidiary filing, but is verifiable from the EU State Aid Transparency Register, concerns the volume of public funding received by the parent company, Kurier Zeitungsverlag und Druckerei Gesellschaft m.b.H. (FN 107826v). According to the register, the parent received seven state aid grants in 2024 with a combined value of EUR 4,087,360, administered by RTR-GmbH (Rundfunk und Telekom Regulierungs-GmbH, Department of Funds and Support). The grants fall under three schemes: ‘Aid for Quality Journalism’ (SA.107189), ‘Aid for digital transformation of publishing’ (SA.62555), and ‘Fonds zur Förderung der digitalen Transformation’ (SA.111247). All are direct grants with a Culture or Training objective.

Three further grants to the same beneficiary are dated 10 November 2025, after the editorial subsidiary’s financial year-end of 30 June 2025. These comprise two tranches under ‘Aid for digital transformation of publishing’ (SA.62555) of EUR 369,365 and EUR 351,494, and one tranche under ‘Fonds zur Förderung der digitalen Transformation’ (SA.111247) of EUR 221,811, for a visible 2025 total of EUR 942,670 across these three entries.

To place this in context: the 2024 state aid total of EUR 4.09 million received by the parent is approximately 7.7 times the pre-tax profit of the editorial subsidiary (EUR 529,065) for the full financial year ending June 2025. It is also substantially larger than the EUR 2.8 million equity injection the parent channelled into the subsidiary during the same period. This does not mean the aid funds the subsidiary directly; the grants are received at parent level and their internal allocation is not disclosed in the available filings. But it establishes that RTR-administered public funding is a material component of the Kurier group’s overall financial position, operating alongside a significant restructuring programme that reduced the editorial workforce by nearly one in five. Austrian press subsidy and digital transformation funding operates on the basis of publicly notified state aid schemes approved by the European Commission; these grants are not exceptional but they are rarely discussed alongside the commercial accounts of the beneficiary companies.