Airline shares end higher following Ryanair’s ‘sea change’ comments
Shares of European airlines ended higher today as a result of Ryanair’s ‘sea change’ comments.
The Dublin-based carrier ended 4.2 per cent higher, while British Airways’ owner IAG and Easyjet went up 1.60 and 3.29 per cent respectively.
Earlier today, low-cost carrier Ryanair said it had registered a ‘sea change’ in customer confidence over the last few weeks, as a result of Omicron easing and Covid travel rules relaxing.
“There is a sea change, based on what we believe will be customer confidence and the timing of the peaking of Omicron,” Ryanair’s chief executive Eddie Wilson told Reuters.
“I think people’s mindset has moved as well in terms of ‘I’m traveling’, ‘I’m going’,” he added. “They can see the summer. They are not in the darkest days of where we were the previous year.”
After experiencing a slump in summer bookings over Omicron concerns, the airline expects that next summer available short-haul seats will suffer a 10-15 per cent fall that will increase the average fares.
“The macro view of this is that there are less seats in Europe, so broadly fares will be higher. They have to be,” he added.
The airline was badly hit by the re-introduction of Covid travel measures following the discovery of Omicron, with passenger numbers going down 7 per cent between November and December, City PM reported.
In December, passenger numbers dropped to 9.5 million, down from 10.2 million in November.