On average, flight tickets in 2022 were 48 percent more expensive than in the same period last year and thus cost 14 percent more than before the corona pandemic.
(Photo: dpa)
Dublin Significantly higher ticket prices brought Europe’s largest low-cost airline Ryanair a profit in the Christmas quarter. According to the management, the company should maintain this trend and achieve record results in the financial year running until the end of March. Chief Financial Officer Neil Sorahan expects Ryanair to “continue to grow profitably over the next year and beyond”. Sorahan told the Bloomberg news agency when presenting the quarterly figures on Monday in Dublin.
According to his estimates, the rise in ticket prices should continue around Easter and in the summer. The Dublin stock exchange reacted with slight price losses. The airline’s stock was down around 0.2 percent there at one point.
Ryanair had already announced the quarterly profit of around 200 million euros at the beginning of January and raised the profit forecast for the current financial year to the end of March. Since then, the group management around Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary has been counting on an annual profit adjusted for special effects of 1.325 to 1.425 billion euros.
In the third business quarter up to the end of December, profits of a good 202 million euros were almost exactly as announced. On average, analysts had expected a little more. In the second Corona winter of 2021, Ryanair had made a loss of 96 million euros.
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Ryanair revenue up 57 percent
The British competitor Easyjet, on the other hand, also made a loss in the past quarter, but also expects a profit before taxes for its entire financial year up to the end of September 2023.
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The corona pandemic had hit the aviation industry hard. Many airlines only survived the crisis thanks to state aid and had to get fresh money from shareholders. In 2022, however, air traffic in large parts of the world recovered significantly from the crisis.
Ryanair carried around 38.4 million passengers in the past quarter, 24 percent more than a year earlier. Sales jumped 57 percent to 2.3 billion euros.
This was mainly due to the high ticket prices: According to the information, flight tickets were 48 percent more expensive on average than in the same period last year and thus cost 14 percent more than before the corona pandemic.
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