Horizon Slovakia, a stock brokerage firm from Košice, has added the weekly business magazine Profit to its string of media properties. Horizon vice president Ivan Horský said his firm had no intent of chaging the editorial direction of the magazine.
Horizon Slovakia has recently purchased several media from owners close to the previous government of Vladimír Mečiar. It is now the publisher of the daily tabloid Trhák, the weekly magazine TV Komplet and the monthly crossword puzzle book Lišiak. It also operates the private station Radio Koliba, which was believed to have strong links to Mečiar's Movement for a Democratic Slovakia (HZDS) through the Donar advertising agency owned by Fedor Flašik, as well as Radio Východ and the local Tatry TV.
Horizon and its daughter companies are involved in three spheres of business activities: brokerage activities on the stock market, different gambling operations, and investment through BMG Invest.
The radio stations that Horizon took over have a good position on the Slovak media market, and the general director of Rádio Koliba, Monika Benková, was also once a Horizon vice president. The position of the print media, on the other hand, is rather poor. Trhák reaches only 1.1% of the population, while TV Komplet has been pushed out of the market by Eurotelevízia and Markíza weekly. Lišiak has the best position among the print media with a 10% readership.
Horizon Slovakia is on the list of companies that the National Bank of Slovakia proposed be investigated for violating the law by accepting deposits of money from the general public and promising exceptionally high returns. However, police have not yet begun investigating the company.
