Concert promoter, Denis Desmond's Gaiety Investments last year shared in a £15m (€17.33m) dividend payout from its UK joint venture Festival Republic business with Live Nation.
The £15m dividend is revealed in new accounts filed by Festival Republic Ltd with Companies House in the UK and the dividend payout follows a dividend payout of £16m in 2021.
The accounts show that pre-tax profits at Festival Republic Ltd last year declined by 24% to £14.3m.
The drop in profits came despite revenues surging by 42% rising from £66.48m to £94.33m as the live entertainment business recovered from the impact of Covid-19.
The immediate parent firm of Festival Republic Ltd is the Gaiety Investments-Live Nation joint 50/50 venture firm, LN Gaiety Holdings Ltd.
Mr Desmond sits on the board of Festival Republic and helped to oversee the number of shows staged by Festival Republic in the UK rising from three to 16 in 2022 as the number of paying music fans increased from 711,047 to 1.03m.
At the end of December last, the firm's accumulated profits stood at £15.2m while its cash funds plummeted from £47.2m to £5.6m. A note attached to the accounts states that the company "is profit making, holds cash and has no bank debt".
One of the highlights of the Festival Republic calendar is the annual Reading Festival where last year acts included The 1975, Fountaines D.C, Halsey and The Artic Monkeys.
Desmond and Live Nation also work here together in Ireland to deliver Electric Ireland and a host of other shows and the £15m dividend payout by Festival Republic coincided last year with the operator of Electric Picnic, EP Republic Ltd paying out a dividend of €7m to its parent firm in December of last year.
The dividend payout followed a record 70,000 music fans attending the firm’s flagship event here, the Electric Picnic music festival in Stradbally, Co Laois.
Mr Desmond has described this year's Electric Picnic as "the best ever".
After not taking place for two Covid-19 hit years, Electric Picnic returned last year and those to perform included Dermot Kennedy, Picture This and Anne-Marie with the three day music festival selling out within an hour of going on sale. Tickets for the 2024 event sold out in September.
