Ryanair’s first-half losses reduce to €48m

Ryanair made a loss of €48 million in the six months ended September 30th as passenger traffic rebounded. The company also said it was considering delisting from the London Stock Exchange

The Irish airline reported on Monday that it flew 11.3 million passengers in October, its busiest month this year.

Ryanair said that revenues rose 83 per cent in the six-months ended September 30th – the first half of its financial year – to €2.15 billion from €1.18 billion.

First-half losses fell almost 90 per cent million from €411 million during the same period in 2020. The results indicated that the airline made a profit in its second quarter - the period from July to September - of €225 million. This was its first quarterly profit since the pandemic hit Europe in March 2020.

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Chief executive, Michael O’Leary, said Ryanair expected to lose between €100 million and €200 million in its current financial year, which ends on March 31st 2022.

The airline had previously predicted somewhere between break even and a small loss for this financial year.

Chief financial officer, Neil Sorahan, said the airline continued to boost traffic by cutting prices and noted that fuel prices had risen, although 75 per cent of this year's needs are hedged. "It's mainly stimulation of traffic," he acknowledged.

Profitability

Mr Sorahan added that Ryanair’s “working assumption” was that it would return to profitability in its next financial year, which ends on March 31st 2023.

Ryanair is also considering de-listing its shares from the London Stock Exchange, where the volume of trade in its stock has fallen sharply since Brexit.

Regulations limit non-EU investors from owning more than 49 per cent of airlines registered in the bloc.

Ryanair said the rules made a general migration away from London for EU companies more acute in its case. The airline’s primary listing is in Dublin while its American depositary receipts are traded on New York’s Nasdaq.

Mr Sorahan noted that fewer than 10 per cent of its shares traded in London.

He said that Ryanair would seek shareholders’ views in coming days before reporting back to the board, which will decide on the move.

Mr O’Leary said traffic rebounded in the second quarter, when the EU introduced its EU digital Covid certificate.

“ In recent weeks, we have seen a surge in bookings for the October mid-term and Christmas breaks and we expect this peak buoyancy to continue into Easter and summer 2022,” he added.

Separately, Ryanair reported that it flew 11.1 million people in October, making it the airline’s busiest month of the year so far, marginally ahead of the 11.3 million who travelled with it in August.

Flights

It operated 71,500 flights during the month, selling 84 per cent of the available seats on its ’planes.

The airline carried 13.8 million passengers in October 2019, the year before Covid-19 struck. Passenger numbers were 4.1 million during the same month last year.

Mr O’Leary said the company believed it could carry more than 100 million passengers in this financial year, ahead of the 80 million to 100 million it originally forecast.

He cautioned that this depended on “the continued roll out of vaccines and no adverse Covid-19 developments”.