LONDON, 2015-1-27 — /Travel PR News/ — easyJet revenue grew by £34 million to £931 million for the quarter ended 31 December 2014
Drive demand, conversion and yields across Europe
• Seats flown grew by 2.9% to 16.6 million. Passengers carried increased by 4.1% to 14.9 million, and the load factor increased by 1.0 percentage point to 89.7%.
• Total revenue grew by £34 million to £931 million and revenue per seat grew by 0.8% on a reported basis to £56.16 per seat or by 3.7% at constant currency. The growth in revenue per seat was driven by disciplined allocation of capital across the network, revenue management and digital initiatives and growth in business passenger revenue.
Maintain cost advantage
• Full year cost per seat is expected to be in line with the guidance given at the full year results and be up by 2% on a constant currency basis. As expected in the quarter cost per seat excluding fuel decreased by 0.2% on a reported basis and increased by 3.7% on a constant currency basis.
• The increase at constant currency was primarily driven by anticipated increases in charges at regulated airports, mainly in Germany and Italy, crew costs associated with building a resilient operation ahead of base openings, the phasing of marketing expenditure on the business traveller punctuality campaign and an increase in maintenance costs associated with the planned ageing of the fleet.
• Cost per seat including fuel decreased by 2.0% on a reported basis and increased by 1.6% on a constant currency basis.
Build strong number one and two network positions
• Continued to increase frequencies on routes, such as Geneva to London Gatwick, and connect existing network points, such as Amsterdam to Hamburg.
Disciplined use of capital
• Strong balance sheet with cash and money market deposits of £913 million as at 31 December 2014.
Outlook
With first half bookings in line with last year, easyJet expects to report a first half loss before tax of between £10 million and £30 million assuming normal levels of disruption compared to the £53 million loss reported in the first half of last year.
Commenting on the results, Carolyn McCall, easyJet Chief Executive said:
“easyJet has made a good start to the year by continuing to deliver its strategy of making travel easy and affordable for passengers. We enjoyed a strong October across the network – particularly on UK leisure flights to beach destinations and on French domestic routes where we continued to build passenger numbers after a busy September.”
“We further strengthened our network in the quarter adding around 500,000 seats, the majority of which are from airports where easyJet has a number one or number two position. This combined with our new TV ads aimed at business travellers enabled easyJet to sell record numbers of seats to business travellers in the first quarter.”
“easyJet is well positioned to continue to deliver returns and growth to shareholders.”
For further details please contact easyJet plc:
Institutional investors and analysts:
Will MacLaren +44 (0) 7961 763 879
Michael Barker +44 (0) 7985 890 939
Media:
Paul Moore +44 (0) 7860 794444
Edward Simpkins Finsbury +44 (0) 7947 740551
A copy of this Interim Management Statement is available at http://corporate.easyjet.com/investors – See more at: http://mediacentre.easyjet.com/stories/8923#sthash.lNhuttPO.dpuf