PrintWeek has learnt that this could leave Highbury's printers, which include Wyndeham, Polestar and Southernprint, with unpaid print bills of around 1m. When questioned on this, Highbury House had no comment.

Highbury has warned shareholders that once its magazines are sold, there will effectively be nothing left of the firm.

City analysts have claimed that Highbury House will be unlikely to get more than 8m by selling off all 30 of its remaining titles, the largest of which is lads' mag Front, printed by Southernprint.

This would mean that its lenders, Royal Bank of Scotland and Allied Irish Bank, could be saddled with more than 20m worth of debt. This would leave shareholders such as Kelvin MacKenzie, the former Sun editor who ploughed 1.5m of his own money into the firm, with nothing.

Highbury said in a statement: "Owing to the level of the company's indebtedness and other liabilities, following any sale of the trading activities in the group, it is highly unlikely that there will be any value attributable to the equity in the company."

Highbury timeline
- August 2005 Kelvin MacKenzie becomes chairman after acquiring a 20% stake for 1.5m

- Nov 2005 Highbury reports a 9m pre-tax loss

- Dec 2005 Highbury shares suspended

- Dec 2005 MacKenzie resigns

- Jan 2006 Highbury puts its remaining titles up for sale