The fuel group owned by the man at the centre of the donations controversy that derailed Seán Gallagher’s presidential bid went into the red last year, in spite of revenues increasing 30 per cent to €143 million.
According to accounts filed by Hugh Morgan’s Morgan Fuels Ltd, the Dundalk-registered group recorded a pretax loss of €1.06 million in the year to the end of last March.
During the 2011 presidential campaign, Mr Morgan alleged Mr Gallagher collected a cheque from him at his Morgan Fuels headquarters.
The returns show that the chief factor behind the business going into the red last year was a writedown of €924,013 on property.
The directors state that, excluding the writedown, the business recorded an operating profit of €124,382. Net bank interest payments of €244,180 added to the pretax loss.
The directors state: “The decrease in operating profit from 2011 can be explained by the fact that trading conditions remained challenging.
“Gross margin last year fell from 3.2 per cent to 2.5 per cent 2012 due to an increasingly competitive market and an increase in smaller margin bulk deliveries.”
