Operations

Finances

The publisher of Direkt36 is a public benefit, non-profit company, and no dividends can be extracted from it. The company’s funds are used exclusively for our operations – to achieve our goals. When financial resources allow, we expand our team, carry out larger-scale investigative projects, and build some reserves.

Thanks to the individuals who support us, Direkt36’s independence is guaranteed and the financial basis of our operations is stable. Those who support us know that Direkt36 will still be around in five years’ time, upholding the same values and carrying out the same activities as it does today. This will most certainly be the case even if Fidesz’s Spring 2025 bill tries to create the possibility of arbitrarily silencing independent media and NGOs. We will not stop doing our work.

In our last completed and reported fiscal year, 2024, we received more than 19,000 so-called micro-grants from individuals, even more than the previous year. These donations covered two thirds of Direkt36’s total annual budget of around HUF 120 million. Together with the 1% donations from the Center for Independent Journalism, the proportion was 84% for the year.

You can join our membership program here.

Media outlets such as Direkt36, which perform tasks that are essential to democracy on a non-commercial basis, are supported by a number of foundations and other organisations, mainly international ones. We only accept support from institutions that do not interfere in any way with our work. For 2024, we have received funding for the operation of Direkt36 from the following institutions:

• we have been working with the Center for Independent Journalism in Budapest for several years to collect 1% VAT pledges from the members of the Hungarian public; we campaign together, and a significant part of the donations is given to Direkt36 for investigative articles, as decided by the Foundation’s board and in accordance with information provided in the campaign;
• we received a three-year grant from the Sigrid Rausing Trust (London), starting in 2023;
• we received a one-year grant for 2024 from the Brussels-based Civitates Foundation;
• The Foundation for Democracy & Pluralism (Båstad, Sweden) supported Direkt36 for two years (until June 2024).

OCCRP, one of the world’s leading international investigative organisations, has been a long-standing professional partner; we also received a six-month grant supporting our activities through them in 2023-24, and a further six-month grant in 2024. Similarly, we received an operating grant from Zinc Network (London). These two grants, funded by the USAID program of the government of the United States, contributed around 5% each of our annual costs. Of course, none of these partners had any say in the content we produced – nor did anyone else.

According to the audited accounts for the year 2024, the financial statement and balance sheet total of Direkt36 Nonprofit Ltd. was HUF 426,205 thousand. The amount deposited in stocks and in the company’s bank account is mainly derived from donations already transferred and to be used later for our operations.

Detailed information on the financial year 2024 (in Hungarian)

• Financial statement and balance sheet 2024 (HU) – download
• Notes to the financial statement 2024 (HU) – download
• Public benefit statement 2024 (HU) – download
• Independent auditors’ report 2024 (HU) – download

Previous years

Our institutional supporters in 2025

Our institutional supporters of the last five years

Professional partners