Singapore Airlines Ltd (SIA) on Wednesday posted a narrower annual loss of S$962 million ($694.08 million), at a time when demand remained low due to the pandemic, but said the outlook was improving as travel restrictions were lifted.

SIA's third consecutive net loss in the 12 months ending on March 31 was an improvement from the S$4.3 billion loss a year earlier that included impairment charges on 45 older aircraft.

The latest figure was in line with the average forecast of a S$968.5 million net loss from 11 analysts polled by Refinitiv.

Annual revenue doubled to S$7.6 billion.

($1 = 1.3860 Singapore dollars)

(Reporting by Jamie Freed in Sydney; Editing by Andrew Heavens)