Saturday, May 11, 2013

(this article was first published on Thursday) 


   By Rory Jones

Emirates Airline expects this year to be more profitable as it continues to push more passengers through its hub in Dubai, an effort helped by its recent alliance with Australia's Qantas Airways (QAN.AU) as it looks to further tap the fast growing Asia-Pacific markets for traffic.

The deal with Qantas, launched March 31, includes flight coordination and merged frequent flier programs and strengthens both carriers' positions in the highly contested Europe to Australia market. Asia and Australasia was the biggest region by revenue for Emirates last year, adding about $5.7 billion to the carrier's top line and underlining the sector's significance to its growth plans.

"We move into the new financial year with confidence and a clear vision of where we are headed," Emirates Chairman Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum said Thursday as the airline presented its full year results. "We have no doubt that the year ahead will again be more profitable than the last."

Many European airlines have been struggling with high fuel prices, lower passenger numbers and competition from budget carriers forcing them to put in place restructuring plans to turn their businesses around. Deutsche Lufthansa AG's first-quarter results fell short of expectations as the German carrier reported a EUR459 million ($603.7 million) loss, and Air France-KLM's net loss widened in the quarter to EUR630 million, compared with EUR368 million in the same period a year ago.

Meanwhile, Emirates launched 10 new destinations across six continents and took delivery of 34 aircraft in the year to March 31, including 10 Airbus A380s and 20 Boeing 777-300ERs. It also has 198 more aircraft on order worth more than $71 billion at list prices.

"Emirates is still growing while European legacy carriers are being shackled by home-market recession and airport capacity constraints," said John Strickland, director of aviation consultancy JLS Consulting.

Full-year net profit rose 52% on year to $622 million as passenger traffic increased 16% to 39.4 million. The airline's load factor--a measure of the capacity of its flights--remained the same as last year at 80%, but revenue rose 17% to $19.9 billion as its fleet of aircraft ferried more customers from Asia and Australia onward to Europe via the Middle East, the carrier said.

Emirates Group, which includes the airline, airport services group Dnata, a number of luxury hotels and other facilities in Dubai, posted a full-year net profit of $845 million, up 34% on year, as revenues grew 17% to $21.1 billion.

Write to Rory Jones at rory.jones@dowjones.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

11-05-13 0702GMT