Hibs have announced a net profit of over £900,000 in their latest accounts after taking in over £5 million in extra financial help because of the coronavirus pandemic.
The Easter Road side have detailed a £2.88 million loan from the Scottish Government and around £2.5 million in business interruption insurance and furlough income in the year up to the end of June 2021.
The £919,000 profit compares to a net loss of £1.23 million in the previous 12 months.
The figures show a fall of four per cent in turnover to £8.55 million, which the club attributes to reduced gate receipts from home and cup matches.
However, that was offset by slightly reduced operating and staff costs, despite performance-based bonuses triggered by the team finishing third in the Premiership and reaching the League Cup semi-final and Scottish Cup final.
A further £600,000 was received in ‘donations’, with around half of that coming from Hibernian Supporters Limited, the second-largest shareholder in the club and provider of regular monthly contributions.
It left Hibs with £6.95 million in the bank, an increase from £5.36 million 12 months previously.
The accounts are detailed in a letter to shareholders from chairman and owner Ron Gordon ahead of the club’s annual general meeting on March 3, which he will attend online from his home in the United States.
Gordon said: “The club would again like to thank supporters for their continued support through season-ticket purchases during this challenging time.
“It does - at last - appear that we are seeing increased normality return on a more sustainable basis, and that is very welcome.
“While having supporters inside our stadium is essential to Hibernian in a financial sense, it is just as important to remember that football is sadly depleted without supporters generating colour, noise, excitement, energy and passion.”
Meanwhile, chief executive Ben Kensell has set out Hibs’ ambitions of a top-four finish in the Premiership, European success and a cup triumph under new manager Shaun Maloney.
Maloney has endured a sticky start to management and has come in for some criticism after a run of six league matches without a victory since the winter break, which leaves the team sitting in seventh in the table and just four points above this weekend’s opponents, Ross County, who lie 10th.
However, Kensell is convinced the former Celtic and Scotland attacker is the right man for the Easter Road side and believes they can aim high.
Having reached the Scottish Cup quarter-finals last weekend, he said: “Cup competitions are always massively important to this club. We’ve been relatively successful, in terms of in the short-to-medium history around reaching the deeper stages of the cups.
“We want to win one. That will always be an objective for this club - it should be.
“We’re a big club in this league and we have a very clear objective of a top-four finish.
“That will unlock our European aspirations, which therefore unlocks a good financial kind of rewards from that and opportunities to go deeper than we’ve ever gone into Europe.
“That’s very much Shaun’s ambition as well."
He added: “The word ‘transition’ has been used a lot, but you can’t call it anything else. It’s a process and I’m very, very confident that people are starting to see the green shoots and the signs of Shaun’s sort of playing philosophy [and] style coming through, and the players really adapting to that.”
