Naresh Goyal -promoted Jet Airways on Thursday narrowed its net loss for the second quarter ended September 30 to Rs 99.67 crore from Rs 713 crore in the same quarter last year.
The airline, which had swung to profits after five straight quarters of losses in the first quarter, returned to losses as passenger traffic declined and fuel prices rose in the second quarter.
Jet Airways? net sales for the second quarter stood at Rs 3,755.28 crore, a 20% growth over R3,122.28 crore in the same quarter last year.
?Improvement in yields has helped the group to post an operating profit, however, lean season, slowdown in industry passenger traffic due to weakened due to economic scenario, high fuel prices coupled with high rupee depreciation has pulled the overall results down,? said Nikos Kardassis, chief executive officer, Jet Airways (India) in a statement.
?We have focused on removing loss-making routes, network rationalisation and selective adding routes which made economic sense,? Kardassis added.
?The result of these initiatives are quite evident from the improvement in operating profit year-on-year by R520.2 crore for the Jet group.?
Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, amortisation and rental or Ebitda stood at R666.8 crore against R146.60 crore in the same quarter last financial year.
During the second quarter, the airline also made R4.16-crore profit from sale and lease back of aircraft. The impact of foreign exchange movement resulted in R25.93 crore of notional loss.
The airline?s fuel expenses increased 12.7% to R1,681.36 crore from Rs 1,491.18 crore in the same quarter last year.
The second-quarter (July-September) of the financial year is traditionally a weak quarter for passenger traffic. During the quarter, the airline had a network wide seat factor of only 75%.
The July-September quarter this fiscal has been especially bad for passenger traffic. During July, demand for air tickets fell 8.8%, in August 4.8% and in September 7.7%.
Jet Airways? cost for providing each seat or Cost per Available Seat Kilometre stood at R4.47 while the revenue earned from each available seat or Revenue per Available Seat Kilometre stood at Rs 4.55.
In essence, before taxes and exceptional items, the airline earnt R0.08 from each seat it offered during the quarter.
?This quarter has been very weak for airlines in India,? said an analyst with a foreign brokerage. ?If the passenger traffic wasn?t so low, Jet Airways should have been able to have another profitable quarter. However, things should improve in the next quarter as it will be holiday season and the yields look better.?
?The peak season ahead will help the airline improve the yields further,? said Jet Airways in a statement giving its outlook. ?The forward bookings trends for the quarter are quite encouraging.?
The airline added that it will continue to drop loss-making routes and expand only selectively on routes which contribute to the bottom line. Jet Airways will also offer more business class seats during the holiday season.
On Friday, Jet Airways? shares closed up 3.09% at R361.45. The results were announced during market hours.
