Taylor said that the buy-back and cancellation of 2.7% of the company's issued share capital was a "no-brainer", because interest on the money borrowed to buy the shares would be cheaper than paying the dividend on them.

The deal had been arranged before the interim results were released last Thursday (23 September), but could not go through until the figures were out. Fulmar bought the shares last Thursday (23 September) at 71.5p. The price has since edged up to 73.5p.

The results showed that the commercial and book printing group has pushed profits up by 3.1% to 1.81m, after exceptional costs. Excluding the exceptional costs of reorganising WE Baxter in May, however, Fulmar posted a 24.4% increase in profits to 1.96m. Overall turnover increased 4.2% to 21.63m.

Taylor said that he was "very pleased" with the results, particularly the 1.9% increase in turnover of the commercial print arm, to 15.09m. "The first half of last year wasn't bad anyway, so to get an increase on that was really quite good," said Taylor. For the immediate future, Taylor expressed "cautious optimism", but said: "This industry is extremely difficult to predict at the moment.

"Through the summer, trading has been quite good, but whether we'll see a continuation of that I have absolutely no idea."

Fulmar's book division, which includes White Quill Press and Bookmarque, showed a strong improvement, with turnover up 10.1% to 6.54m, compared to just 1.9% growth in the commercial print division. "It's normal. In books, demand is more continuous and stable than in the commercial arm," said Taylor.

Story Josh Brooks