Europe’s largest low-cost airline Ryanair wants to compete for customers with discounts and boost ticket sales. The company in Dublin announced that the first financial quarter until the end of June required more discounts than in the previous year because the Easter holidays, which were busy with travel, partly fell in March.
However, the board is cautiously optimistic that it will be able to offer prices at least at the previous year’s level during the peak summer travel season – but it may also be possible to push through slightly higher prices, emphasized the Easyjet competitor. The profit forecast for the year as a whole depends heavily on how much Ryanair can charge its passengers between July and September. Management did not dare to give a precise profit forecast.
Ryanair also warned of the risk that the delivery of Boeing aircraft could be further delayed. By the end of July, the board hopes to have a fleet of a total of 158 medium-haul jets from the 737 Max series. That would be 23 copies less than agreed. In recent months, Ryanair has had to cancel flights and reduce its passenger forecast due to delivery delays.
In the financial year to the end of March, the number of passengers transported rose to almost 184 million, which was 23 percent more than before the corona pandemic. The bottom line is that profits increased by almost half compared to the previous year to around 1.9 billion euros. Ryanair also announced a 700 million euro share buyback. The company wants to increase the number of passengers by eight percent to 198 to 200 million passengers in the current financial year.