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Friday, May 11th, 2018
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LATEST NEWS
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The Fraport Group saw revenue and earnings figures increase significantly during the first quarter of business year 2018 (ending March 31). Supported by strong passenger growth at Frankfurt Airport (FRA) and most of the airports in Fraport’s international portfolio, Group revenue advanced by 15.0% to €681.7m. Major revenue contributions came from Fraport Greece (€44.3m) and Fraport Brasil (€30.8m) – following the startup of Fraport’s operations at Fortaleza (FOR) and Porto Alegre (POA) on January 2. At FRA, higher income from airport charges, security services and parking contributed to the Group’s revenue growth.
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Fraport AG’s executive board chairman, Dr. Stefan Schulte, said: “The upward trend from the previous year has continued unabated, both at our international Group companies and at Frankfurt Airport. At our Frankfurt home base, we are working at full speed to meet future growth which is being spurred mainly by the positive development of network airlines. Therefore, we are pushing forward with the construction of our new Terminal 3 and will be realizing Pier G earlier than scheduled. At the same time, we are continuing to invest in the infrastructure and processes of our two existing terminals.”
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Group EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization) increased by 27.2% to €174.7m, with the Group companies in Fortaleza and Porto Alegre contributing €9.2m. Despite higher depreciation and amortization in the amount of €10.2m – mainly in connection with Fraport Greece – Group EBIT reached €82.3m (up 49.4%). The negative financial result continued to decline noticeably, from minus €29.2m to minus €56.1m. This was largely attributable to higher interest expenses both at Fraport Greece (up €18.2m) and the Group companies in Fortaleza and Porto Alegre (up €3.1m). Correspondingly, Group EBT expanded only slightly by 1.2% to €26.2m. The Group result (net profit) rose by 4.3% to €19.6m, stimulated by slightly lower taxes on income.
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Operating cash flow noticeably slipped by 36.1% to €80.5m in the first three months of 2018, attributable to reporting date-related changes in working capital. With minus €66.9m, free cash flow clearly fell into negative territory, as a result of higher investments at FRA and the Group companies in Fortaleza and Porto Alegre, as well as Fraport Greece (Q1 2017: €54.0m).
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Jumping by 10.0% to 14.4 million passengers, traffic at Frankfurt Airport continued to gain momentum during the first quarter of 2018. Most of the Fraport Group’s international airports also reported significant and partly double-digit growth rates. In particular, Antalya Airport (AYT) in Turkey continued to rebound strongly compared to the first quarter of 2017. Only the Greek regional airports registered a slight decline in accumulated passenger numbers (down 2.1%), due mainly to the runway closure at high-traffic Thessaloniki Airport (SKG) for renovation and extension works.
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Willis Lease Finance has reported a pre-tax profit of US$9.6m in the first quarter of 2018. The Company achieved record quarterly lease rent revenue of US$39.6m in the period driven by 86% average utilization of a portfolio that grew 9.2% to US$1.466bn at quarter-end compared to $1.343 billion at December 31, 2017.
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Aggregate lease rent and maintenance reserve revenues were US$55.1m for the first quarter 2018. Diluted weighted average earnings per common share was US$1.00 for the three months ended March 31, 2018.
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“We have continued to maintain strong lease engine utilization while growing the portfolio with the purchase of modern new engines.” said Charles F. Willis, Chairman and CEO. “We plan to maintain strong utilization while growing not only the lease engine portfolio but also our surplus material, asset management and consultancy businesses.”
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GE Aviation and ARINCDirect have agreed to engage in a collaborative arrangement to provide flight operations quality assurance (FOQA) services based on GE’s C-FOQA Centerline™ service.
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GE and ARINCDirect will collaborate to build data integrations between C-FOQA Centerline and ARINCDirect’s existing services, enabling FOQA data to be made available during the flight planning process. In addition, GE Aviation and ARINCDirect anticipate that over a ten-year service period, GE will assist ARINCDirect in the development of additional flight analytics services for their customers.
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During the first phase of the agreement this summer, ARINCDirect and GE will work together with a group of their joint customers to develop the means to deliver C-FOQA Centerline to ARINCDirect customers through their existing ARINCDirect Flight Planning Portal.
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The goal of this phase is to enable ARINCDirect customers to access C-FOQA Centerline safety analysis reports and tool through the same web portal and on the same mobile and desktop devices that they already use for all their other ARINCDirect services. GE and ARINCDirect will work collaboratively with their joint customers to create new elements for the C-FOQA Centerline tailored specifically for ARINCDirect and designed to be delivered through the ARINCDirect portal.
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Once the phase one development is completed, ARINCDirect will offer C-FOQA Centerline along with ARINCDirect enhancements, directly to all their customers. Business jet operators would be able to acquire C-FOQA Centerline service as part of the flight planning and other services directly from ARINCDirect.
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Aerospace Engineering Solutions (AES Global), a UK based aerospace design and certification organisation, has obtained a new EASA Supplemental Type Certificate to allow the use of Transmitting Portable Electronic Devices (T-PED) on all Boeing 777 aircraft models.
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Following an intense certification effort, AES Global has developed this STC for the operator to ensure their fleet of aircraft is capable of using portable electronic devices safely and securely in all phases of flight.
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This EASA STC (No 10065407) can be used by an operator as evidence to meet the operational requirements of AMC1 CAT.GEN.MPA.140 (Reg (EU) No 965/2012; Part-CAT) and AMC1 NCC.GEN.130 (Reg (EU) No 965/2012; Part-NCC) for portable electronic devices operating in the 2.4GHz and 5GHz frequency band. It can an also be used in combination with a Wi-Fi system activation to allow full use of T-PED’s.
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Avolon Holdings, the international aircraft leasing company, has reported the re-pricing and extension of its senior secured US$4.75bn Term Loan B facility.
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The Facility has now been extended from an original maturity of April 2022 to January 2025 and has been repriced at LIBOR plus 2.00% with a LIBOR floor of 0.75%, subject to an Original Issue Discount (OID) of 99.75.
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In conjunction with this repricing Avolon repaid US$214m of the original facility, bringing the outstanding balance to US$4.75bn.
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Hawaiian Airlines has announced its system-wide traffic statistics for the month ended April 30, 2018. Hawaiian welcomed more than 961 thousand guests in April 2018, an increase of 6.3% over the same period last year. Total traffic increased 7.1% on an increase of 7.3% in capacity. Load factor decreased 0.1 points to 85.2%.
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Ryanair has named Chiara Ravara as its new Head of Sales & Marketing, promoting her from her previous role as Senior Sales & Marketing Manager.
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Chiara has worked in Ryanair since 2014, joining from Aviareps in Italy, and will spearhead Ryanair’s Sales & Marketing team and activities across 37 countries in Europe and North Africa.
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The U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics has revealed that the 23 largest American carriers made a combined profit of US$15.5 billion last year, resulting in an after-tax profit being recorded for the fifth year in succession. This shows that the strong rebound from the previous ten years of losses continues.
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However, the airline industry has played down the actual level of profit, crediting a part of it to the tax overhaul legislation adopted last year by federal lawmakers. Additionally, fuel and labor costs rose by US$7bn compared to 2016.
Alison McAfee, a spokesperson for Airlines for America (A4A), the trade group representing the country’s biggest carriers, commented that a profitable airline industry is good news for passengers. “Airline profitability benefits customers as airlines are strong, able to compete and reinvest in their business with new planes, products and destinations, including expanded service to small communities and internationally, which in turn creates jobs,” adding that America’s airline industry was boosted by 450 new planes last year.
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In addition to basic flight ticket revenue, airlines took US$4.6 billion from baggage fees and US$2.9 billion from reservation change fees, while these figures do not include additional revenue generated from food, drinks, transportation of animals, etc.
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UPCOMING EVENTS
June 5, 2018 – Jury’s Inn Hotel, Prague
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