Singapore Airlines clocks second-best quarterly profit

Singapore Airlines Ltd. delivered its second-biggest quarterly profit on record as demand for flights kept airfares elevated.

Net income in the second quarter through September climbed 27% from a year earlier to S$707 million ($522 million), the carrier said in a statement Tuesday. Revenue rose 4.3% to S$4.7 billion.

Demand remains strong in the rebound from Covid — including low-cost unit Scoot, Singapore Airlines’ passenger traffic totaled 8.9 million in the quarter, up 42% from a year earlier. Group capacity is expected to reach about 92% of pre-pandemic levels on average in December.  

Singapore’s flag carrier warned that air travel returning to normal puts pressure on yields. It also flagged heightened geopolitical and macroeconomic risks that will “continue to pose challenges for the airline industry.”

Singapore Airlines saw a 13.6% drop in net fuel costs, helped by hedging.

Passenger load factor, an indicator of how full planes are, was 88.6%, up 2 percentage points from the same period last year.

Singapore Airlines shares rose as much as 2.4% Wednesday morning after the earnings were announced. They’re up about 14% this year, fifth-best on the Bloomberg World Airlines Index, which is down 8% in 2023.