Dubai: Shares in Sharjah budget carrier Air Arabia rose by more than 3 per cent on the Dubai bourse on Monday after the airline reported a 34 per cent increase in first quarter profit.
The UAE’s only listed airline made Dh114 million in the three months to March 31 compared to Dh85 million in the same period a year earlier, according to a statement posted on the Dubai Financial Market (DFM). Revenue rose 7 per cent to Dh946 million over the period.
Air Arabia shares closed up 3.23 per cent to Dh1.28 on the DFM with the carrier’s first quarter performance beating analyst expectations. Three analysts polled by Reuters forecast, on average, a first quarter profit of Dh88.8 million. It is the first quarter where the airline has reported a rise in profits in the past four quarters.
Air Arabia carried 2.1 million passengers between January and March, up 17 per cent, while it filled an average of 81 per cent of seats on all flights over the period.
“Air Arabia has made an excellent start to 2016, maintaining the momentum we established last year and attracting new customers to our brand,” Air Arabia chairman Shaikh Abdullah Bin Mohammad Al Thani said in the statement.
“Our operational efficiency allied to the success of our route expansion strategy and the popularity of our value-add service proposition, leaves Air Arabia well placed to navigate the current macroeconomic challenges and benefit from the many opportunities in the region’s aviation sector,” he said.
In March, Air Arabia started flights from Sharjah to Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and has announced it will launch seasonal services to Batumi in Georgia between July and September. Its Moroccan and Jordanian joint ventures also launched new routes including Air Arabia Jordan starting flights from Amman to Riyadh.
Air Arabia also runs fully-owned operations in Ras Al Khaimah, the most northern emirate in the UAE, and a joint venture in Egypt.
