QM bonus pay-out is £900,000 as losses hit £600,000

Corporate finance adviser Quayle Munro made a £600,000 loss in its first half after paying out £900,000 in bonuses and share options to staff.

Chairman Andrew Tuckey said the payments were related to the previous year's performance. He said that, excluding these payments, underlying profit was 300,000 compared to a 400,000 loss for the corresponding period.

Tuckey said the six months to the end of December was "a period of relative calm" after making a number of changes in the business including the closure of its US office.

Revenues were 5.3 million compared with 5.2m in 2009, while like-for-like advisory business revenues were up 14 per cent. The Edinburgh and London-based firm said that Morris Group, the house builder in which Quayle has a 23 per cent stake, traded "satisfactorily" despite "continuing difficult market conditions".

Investments in a range of smaller firms continued to trade profitably.

Quayle said sales at medical device firm Tayside Flow Technologies (TFT) remained "disappointingly slow" but that a new management team joined in November. The firm added the Dundee-based TFT will need to raise further funding in addition to the 300,000 raised for it by Braveheart Investment Group in December.

The company declared an unchanged 10p interim dividend.