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KUALA LUMPUR: AirAsia X Bhd (AAX), the long-haul, low-cost airline affiliate of the AirAsia group, carried 3.61 million passengers last year, 14.6% fewer compared to the preceding year.
It said in a statement that the 2015 financial year (FY2015) was a challenging year, as the group was set back by “irrational competition from industry peers, currency volatility, regulatory uncertainties for Thailand and Indonesia, as well as a series of unforeseen circumstances.”
AAX’s performance was a contrast to AirAsia Bhd’s. The latter reported a 11.2% growth in passengers carried at group level (to 50.68 million) and a 9.6% growth for Malaysia AirAsia (to 24.25 million) in 2015. (see AirAsia group carried 11% more passengers in 2015)
Passenger load factor fell 7 percentage points (ppt) to 75% for the year, but for the fourth quarter (Q4), load factor improved 2 ppt year-on-year to 83%. This was despite higher average base fare as compared to Q4 2014.
“This positive achievement was driven by aggressive marketing activities, enhanced Fly-Thru connectivity in FY2015, and the returned traffic after the challenging market conditions in 2014 - H1 2015. However, further improvement was hindered by slower-than-expected recovery of Kathmandu’s operations after the massive Nepal earthquake,” AAX said.
The carrier said Thai AirAsia X
(recorded a healthy passenger load factor of 83% in Q4 2015 during the year-end peak while Indonesia AirAsia X’s overall operating performance registered a consistent trend in the quarter.
The number of flights flown, meanwhile, dipped 4.6% to 13,033 in 2015.
“Moving forward into 2016, AirAsia X remains vigilant and continues to explore strategic initiatives to ensure sustainable growth,” AAX said.
AAX shares inched up half a sen to close at 25 sen, with 27.048 million shares being traded.
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