In 2007 the group made a pre-tax profit of £439m.

For 2009 the bank reported a 24% fall in pre-tax profit to $7bn.

In 2006 pre-tax profits were £21.4m on sales of almost £300m.

The group had a good first year, with pre-tax profits up from £14.3m to £18.6m.

It made a pre-tax profit of $7.5 million in 2009.

Today's pre-tax profits for the nine months to September 30 were up by 56% to £1.03bn from £657m in the same period last year.

During the 28 weeks to September 26 the company made pre-tax profits of £391.1m, compared with £327.5m last year.

And last week part of this was revealed as the group turned in 1991 pre-tax profits 5pc down on 1990 to £251m.

Its pre-tax profit is around 5%, a third to a half of what large mass media companies require.

In 1991, pre-tax profits increased by a further 31% to £921,919.