The number of passengers travelling with easyJet on business in the second quarter of 2011 increased by 20%, and total revenue grew by 23.2% to £935 million. Continued progress in implementing the strategy outlined last November, including the launch of a flexible fare on easyJet.com, enabled the airline to introduce ‘travelling on business’ initiatives.
On Time Performance continues to improve and was above 80% for the network in the quarter. The number of seats flown rose by 17.1% to 16.7 million, load factors improved by 0.2 percentage points to 86.3%, and sector length declined by 1.6%. There was a 17.3% growth in passengers (8.8% growth excluding the impact of the 2010 volcano).
Total revenue per seat grew by 5.2% to £56.02, up 4.6% on a constant currency basis. Passenger revenue grew by 2.5% to £44.37 per seat as capacity investments made in F10 and the first half of F11 began to mature. Ancillary revenues grew strongly up 17.0% per seat to £11.65 as a result of management actions taken in the second quarter. EasyJet had £112 million of net cash at 30th June 2011.
Carolyn McCall, easyJet Chief Executive said: “The strong operational and commercial performance in the quarter reflects the continued successful implementation of the strategy we outlined last November. August is the important trading month for easyJet but with over 75% of summer seats now sold we expect at current fuel and exchange rates to deliver a pre-tax profit for the year ended 30th September 2011 of between £200 million and £230 million assuming normal conditions and a ROCE for the year of between 10% and 12%. Against the backdrop of high fuel prices and an uncertain economic environment, the strength of easyJet’s trading demonstrates it is well placed to succeed.”
