BUSINESSMAN DERMOT Desmond has increased his shareholding in Independent News Media to 3.21 per cent.

An announcement issued to the stock exchange yesterday revealed that IIU Nominees Ltd, an investment vehicle controlled by Mr Desmond, acquired an additional 4 million INM shares on August 25th. This brought his total holding to 17.7 million shares and resulted in IIU crossing the 3 per cent threshold for declaring a shareholding in a company listed on the Irish Stock Exchange.

It is not clear how much Mr Desmond paid for the INM stock last week but shares traded on the day at between 26.5 cent and 27.02 cent. This would indicate that Mr Desmond paid up to €1.08 million for the additional shares.

INM closed in Dublin yesterday up just more than 1 per cent at 28.5 cent. So Mr Desmond has made a small paper profit already on his latest share buying in the media company. However, he would be underwater on his total holding in the media group, having acquired 13.7 million shares at more than 50 cent each earlier this year.

In May, The Irish Times revealed that Mr Desmond had quietly built up a stake of more than 2 per cent in INM, whose stable of newspaper titles here includes the Irish Independent, the Evening Herald, the Sunday Independent and the Sunday World.

This holding was not declared by IIU at the time as it was below the threshold for notifying a stake.

Mr Desmond was represented at INM’s annual meeting in June.

In a lengthy statement, John Bateson, finance director at IIU, described the destruction of shareholder value at the company since 2007 as “shocking”.

INM’s biggest shareholders are Denis O’Brien, who owns 21.6 per cent and Sir Anthony O’Reilly who has a 14.7 stake.