Cathay Pacific (0293) announced its construction data for December last year, and also forecast a loss of between RMB 6.4 billion and RMB 7 billion for the whole of last year, which is wider than the RMB 5.5 billion in 2021.
Cathay Pacific also pointed out that the performance of its airlines last year and the next year has improved significantly compared to the first half of the year. For the whole year, it still recorded a slight loss, but its affiliated companies recorded a large loss.
Cathay Pacific CEO Lin Shaobo pointed out that he is pleased to see that the operating and financial conditions of its airlines and subsidiaries continued to improve in the second half of last year.
The gradual relaxation of travel restrictions and quarantine requirements in Hong Kong has enabled the company to achieve positive cash flow from its overall operations in the second half of last year.
Lin Shaobo also pointed out that looking forward to 2023, the status of Cathay Pacific and Hong Kong as an international shipping hub will continue to be rebuilt, but there will be many challenges in the future, and he will promote the return to normal with a prudent and responsible attitude.
He expects that the company's Cathay Pacific and Hong Kong Express are expected to be able to operate 70% of the passenger flight capacity before the epidemic by the end of 2023, and the goal is to restore the pre-epidemic passenger capacity by the end of 2024.
More than 100 pairs of flights to and from 14 mainland cities per month at the end of February
Lin Shaobo pointed out that in terms of passenger transport, it is expected that the demand will continue to be strong in January and during the Lunar New Year period, mainly driven by the demand for travel and leisure travel.
After the resumption of quarantine-free customs clearance in Hong Kong and the Mainland, we will continue to add more flights and destinations as soon as feasible. The goal is to operate more than 100 pairs of flights between Hong Kong and 14 cities in the Mainland every week by the end of February.
Lin Shaobo also pointed out that in terms of freight, he is happy to see that the restrictions on cross-boundary truck transportation between Hong Kong and the Mainland have been relaxed.
However, as various parts of the mainland are still affected by the epidemic, and January coincides with the Lunar New Year, the air cargo market will still face challenges before mid-February and will respond flexibly.
Passenger traffic increased by nearly 769% year-on-year last month
On the other hand, the company also announced its operating data for December last year. The number of passengers carried in that month was 801,000, a year-on-year increase of 768.7%, which was still a sharp drop of 73.3% from the level in December 2019.
Revenue passenger kilometers rose 545.2% year-on-year, still down 68.4% from December 2019.
The passenger load factor was 83.3%, an increase of 46.7 percentage points, and the transport capacity increased by 183.5%, which was still 67.8% lower than that in December 2019.
Lin Shaobo pointed out that the average number of passengers per day in December was 25,800.
In terms of freight, 106,400 metric tons were carried in December last year, a year-on-year decrease of 21%, and a year-on-year decrease of 40% from December 2019.
During the month, the ton-kilometers of cargo revenue decreased by 22.6% year-on-year, and fell by 34% compared with December 2019.
The load factor fell by 16.9 percentage points to 67.3%, and the capacity fell by 3.2% year-on-year.