Australia’s Qantas Airways yesterday announced a 4.3 percent drop in full-year net profits, but voiced cautious optimism for the industry after its battering in the financial crisis.
Net profits were A$112 million (US$101 million), down from A$117 million a year earlier, while underlying pre-tax profits rose three-fold to A$377 million after last year’s massive cost-cutting.
“While global trading conditions remained challenging, they continued to improve and the Qantas Group has delivered a strong result, more than tripling its full year profit year-on-year,” chief executive Alan Joyce said.
PHOTO: BLOOMBERG
“International demand and yield across the business and leisure sectors continue to improve and domestic business demand is also strengthening,” he added.
Joyce said all sectors of the group, including budget offshoot Jetstar, were profitable and that the company expects to increase capacity in the first half of next year.
However, Qantas did not pay a dividend to shareholders for the second year running and declined to forecast future profits “given the volatility and uncertainty of the aviation market.”
Joyce said the company, which pledged to dramatically slash costs as profits dropped 88 percent last year, was seeing “encouraging signs” as freight and premium travel pick up.
“We are seeing some very good signs of improvement. Our freight business has seen a real improvement and our premium business has seen a recovery,” he told public broadcaster ABC.
“We’ve seen some very encouraging signs. We’re starting to become more optimistic about the future,” Joyce added.
The Qantas group controls about two-thirds of the domestic market and some 30 percent of international passenger flights in Australia.
Joyce said a “high level of uncertainty” remained, but conditions had vastly improved since the slowdown, despite renewed jitters over growth in Europe, China and the US.
“There is still a high level of uncertainty ... but we’ve seen a big improvement from the depths of the GFC [global financial crisis],” Joyce said.
“We’ve seen the freight market rebound, our freighters have had a record year, which is a good sign of business activity, and our premium traffic is rebounding,” he said.
Revenue fell 5.4 percent to A$13.8 billion dollars, while Qantas retains a cash balance of A$3.7 billion.
WAITING GAME: The US has so far only offered a ‘best rate tariff,’ which officials assume is about 15 percent, the same as Japan, a person familiar with the matter said Taiwan and the US have completed “technical consultations” regarding tariffs and a finalized rate is expected to be released soon, Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) told a news conference yesterday, as a 90-day pause on US President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs is set to expire today. The two countries have reached a “certain degree of consensus” on issues such as tariffs, nontariff trade barriers, trade facilitation, supply chain resilience and economic security, Lee said. They also discussed opportunities for cooperation, investment and procurement, she said. A joint statement is still being negotiated and would be released once the US government has made
NEW GEAR: On top of the new Tien Kung IV air defense missiles, the military is expected to place orders for a new combat vehicle next year for delivery in 2028 Mass production of Tien Kung IV (Sky Bow IV) missiles is expected to start next year, with plans to order 122 pods, the Ministry of National Defense’s (MND) latest list of regulated military material showed. The document said that the armed forces would obtain 46 pods of the air defense missiles next year and 76 pods the year after that. The Tien Kung IV is designed to intercept cruise missiles and ballistic missiles to an altitude of 70km, compared with the 60km maximum altitude achieved by the Missile Segment Enhancement variant of PAC-3 systems. A defense source said yesterday that the number of
Taiwanese exports to the US are to be subject to a 20 percent tariff starting on Thursday next week, according to an executive order signed by US President Donald Trump yesterday. The 20 percent levy was the same as the tariffs imposed on Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh by Trump. It was higher than the tariffs imposed on Japan, South Korea and the EU (15 percent), as well as those on the Philippines (19 percent). A Taiwan official with knowledge of the matter said it is a "phased" tariff rate, and negotiations would continue. "Once negotiations conclude, Taiwan will obtain a better
FLOOD RECOVERY: “Post-Typhoon Danas reconstruction special act” is expected to be approved on Thursday, the premier said, adding the flood control in affected areas would be prioritized About 200cm of rainfall fell in parts of southern Taiwan from Monday last week to 9am yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Kaohsiung’s Taoyuan District (桃源) saw total rainfall of 2,205mm, while Pingtung County’s Sandimen Township (三地門) had 2,060.5mm and Tainan’s Nanhua District (南化) 1,833mm, according to CWA data. Meanwhile, Alishan (阿里山) in Chiayi County saw 1,688mm of accumulated rain and Yunlin County’s Caoling (草嶺) had 1,025mm. The Pingtung County Government said that 831 local residents have been pre-emptively evacuated from mountainous areas. A total of 576 are staying with relatives in low-lying areas, while the other 255 are in shelters. CWA forecaster
RSS