Scandinavian airline SAS reported a smaller-than-expected pre-tax loss in the second quarter today and said it continued to see major challenges ahead.
The airline, half-owned by Sweden, Norway and Denmark, said it made a pretax loss of 600 million Swedish crowns (€63.6 million) in the period.
Analysts had forecast a loss of 758 million crowns. The airline made a loss of 1.0 billion crowns in the same period a year earlier.
"Although the situation in 2010 for the aviation industry has improved compared with 2009, the sector and we as a company are faced with major challenges moving forward," Chief Executive Mats Jansson said.
He said uncertain macroeconomic trends, volatility in exchange rates and jet-fuel prices were among the challenges the firm faced.
"Although we are on the right path, there is some way to go before we achieve profitability," he said.
The second quarter started badly for European airlines because they were forced to ground traffic as a cloud of ash spread across the continent from a volcano in Iceland.
Since then, business travel has picked up and traffic figures have been improving, particularly on Asian routes.
German flagship airline Lufthansa reported better-than-expected second-quarter profits and said its results this year would be higher than last year's €130 million profit, thanks to the global economic recovery.
Rival Air France-KLM posted a narrower-than-expected second quarter loss.
Reuters