Chime Communications' Pre-Tax Profit Down 15% To $22M For First Half Of '15

Chime Communications' profit before tax for the first half of  '15 was £14M ($21.92M), down 15% on the same period in '14, according to James Swift of CAMPAIGN LIVE. The owner of VCCP said its £16.5M profit before tax in the first half of '14 "was achieved thanks to the World Cup and was tough to repeat because there were no sports tournaments on the same scale" in the first half of '15. Operating income at Chime for the first half of '15 "was higher" than it was in the first half of '14, however, at £102.6M, up 5.9% from £96.9M. The group’s operating profit margin "also dropped almost four percentage points over the same period," from 18.1% to 14.8%. Again, Chime said that "this drop was due to the abnormally strong performance of the sports and entertainment division in the first six months of 2014" (CAMPAIGN LIVE, 8/18).