05:19 pm - Tuesday
IATA: US$6 billion lost in the first six months of 2009
Geneva, Switzerland - Despite a slight growth of traffic
(WAPA) - The IATA (International Air Transport Association) today announced the first results concerning the January-June 2009 period. The air transport industry lost more than US$6 billion: in the second quarter the overall negative result has been of US$ 2 billion, following the US$4 billion lost in the first three months of the year. However, there are slight signs of improvement both in passengers and freight traffic (see AVIONEWS).
The main reasons of these huge losses are, first of all, the impossibility to match the slump in air traffic with a suitable capacity reduction (passengers' load factor has been of 80.3%), and furthermore an increase in fuel cost only partially contrasted by fuel-hedging contracts.
"Travel only began to stabilise at the end of the first quarter -said the IATA in a note- There was a material improvement in July but the future path is likely to be volatile and weaker than normal recoveries" (Avionews)
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Direttore Clara Moschini