An investment sale helped Lycos Europe show a net profit for the first half of 2007 but operations lost EUR 7.6 million ($10.38 million). Lycos Europe, the Netherlands-based web portal part-owned by Bertelsmannn and Telefonica (separate from Lycos USA), blamed “decreasing advertising revenues, additional marketing initiatives.” The company recorded a net profit of EUR 48.7 million ($66.5 million) after a EUR 64.8 million ($88.5 million) transaction gain from offloading shares in Czech portal Seznam.cz and a EUR 19.2 million ($26 million) impairment loss thanks to decline in use of its Fireball German search engine. Earlier this month, Lycos Europe spent $5.2 million to renew its trademark deal with Lycos Inc.
Earnings release