The company, best-known for its flagship Daily Mail tabloid, said pre-tax pre-exceptional profits jumped 55% to £72.7m ($119.1m).

And it says prospects for the rest of the financial year remain good provided the current trading conditions and advertising trends for the group's newspapers in the UK continue.

"Some of the factors which have affected the first half result, particularly the extent of the newsprint price effect and the accounting impact of the Teletext acquisition last year, will not be repeated in the second half year," it said.

Associated Newspapers had a good half year with further circulation rises for all three of its titles which include the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday and the Evening Standard, and advertising revenues up 11%.

The improvement in its results over the previous year was helped by the timing of newsprint price falls.

Regional papers perform well

"Northcliffe Newspapers also thrived on the strength of advertising revenues across its titles, up some 8% in total over last year," the company said.

On top of this more than half its titles posted circulation increases in the July-December 1997 period.

The rate of growth of recruitment advertising seems to be slowing, from an "unsustainable" peak growth level of around 25% per annum.

Profits on sales of assets arose mainly from the disposal of surplus properties in London and Manchester.

The group's net borrowings at the end of the period were £537m, an increase of £18m since the year-end.