This morning, airline company Ryanair Holdings PLC announced their full year results for FY 2024.
Record-breaking profits
The Irish company reported a 34% rise in profits after tax to €1.92 billion as the carrier saw an increase in customers to 183.7 million fliers in the year, a 9% increase as compared with 2023.
This is the highest level of profit ever recorded for the airline company.
Revenues also increased by a significant 25% to €13.44 billion.
Rising costs
This was in spite of Ryanair’s fuel bill rising by about €1.25 billion, roughly 32%, to a total of €5.14 billion for fuel costs. On this fact, Ryanair said that:
The group’s industry leading cost base and increased revenues helped to offset a significantly higher fuel bill as hedged oil prices rose from $65 per barrel of crude oil in FY23 to $89 for barrel in FY24.”
Boeing impacts on Ryanair plans
Ryanair also provided a Boeing update. Like other airlines, Ryanair has been impacted by the myriad problems facing the US aircraft maker.
Ryanair had a fleet of 146x B737 Gamechanger planes at year-end, and we hope to increase this to 158 by the end of July, which is 23 short of our contracted Boeing deliveries. We continue to work closely with Boeing CEO (Dave Calhoun), CFO (Brian West) and the new Seattle management team to improve quality and accelerate B737 aircraft deliveries. There remains a risk that Boeing deliveries could slip further. We plan to deliver as much growth as possible for passengers and airport partners in Summer 2024, although these delays mean more traffic growth will occur in lower yielding H2 than planned. To facilitate this growth, we will continue to take delivery of Boeing 737s through July, August, and September.”
However, Ryanair remained optimistic about future prospects, saying that “travel demand in Europe is strong for Summer 2024 and, despite Boeing delivery delays, we will operate our largest ever Summer schedule with over 200 new routes (and 5 new bases).”
Dividends and share buybacks
It’s been an exciting first half of 2024 so far for Ryanair. Today’s earnings mark the highest In February, the company paid its first-ever dividend of €0.175 to shareholders.
They also announced today that a final dividend for the 2024 FY of €0.178 will be payable in September 2024. This will be the company’s second dividend ever, coming out approximately six months after its first.
The company will also engage in a share buyback scheme for its shareholders. As it announced today:
Given current surplus cash, the Board has approved a €700 s million share buyback now (which will formally launch later this week). This buyback when completed, will increase the funds Ryanair has returned to shareholders since 2008 to over €7.8 billion.”
FY 2025 Ryanair outlook
Skies look clear for Ryanair in the upcoming financial year – but this is heavily dependent on keeping fuel costs in check and also on relative geopolitical stability in the Middle East and Ukraine areas.
Ryanair expects to grow FY25 traffic by 8% (198 million to 200 million passengers), subject to Boeing deliveries returning to contracted levels before year-end. Summer 2024 demand is positive, with bookings trending ahead of last year. Recent pricing is softer than we expected, with Q1 requiring more price stimulation than last year (particularly as half of Easter moved into March and out of April).”
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