Lufthansa’s profits nearly halve, daughters also take blows

As expected, Lufthansa’s second-quarter profit almost halved compared to the same period last year. Net profit came in at 469 million euros, down from 881 million euros in 2023, or a 47% drop year-on-year.

Due to increasing competition and overcapacity on certain lines, the group cannot sustain the high ticket prices after the coronavirus pandemic. In addition, strikes in Germany weighed on the result by 100 million euros. Subsidiary Brussels Airlines and Swiss also posted lower spring profits.

As many as 36 million passengers

Sales for the German airline group, Europe’s largest, were nevertheless 7% higher in the second quarter, at 10 billion euros, also because prices remain well above the pre-Covid-19 pandemic levels. The group, including Brussels Airlines, carried 36 million passengers in the spring, almost 3 million more than in the same period last year.

However, operating costs in that quarter were also 10% higher than last year, so the group is launching a large-scale cost-cutting exercise at its eponymous German subsidiary. According to the Bloomberg news agency, this will involve removing some 50 obsolete long-haul aircraft from the fleet, which will disappear by 2028.

The operating profit target for 2024 is also being revised downward due to the cost-cutting measures to between 1.4 and 1.8 billion euros, compared with about 2.2 billion previously.

Operational loss of €47 million for Brussels Airlines

Brussels Airlines posted an adjusted operating profit of 11.6 million euros from April to the end of June. That’s down from 31 million euros in the same period last year. Brussels Airlines refers to lower production due to, among other things, a lack of spare parts and the loss of a lease contract.

For the first six months, the Belgian carrier suffered an operating loss of 47 million euros due to strikes in the first months of the year, among other factors. The number of passengers transported, at 3.9 million, was almost the same as in the first half of 2023.

Still, demand for airline tickets remains high, and Brussels Airlines sees strong summer results. The company expects to make a profit for all of 2024, with roughly similar results to the record year 2023. Meanwhile, the airline has added an additional Airbus A330 to its fleet and a new destination, Nairobi.

Not as punctual as a Swiss clock

Swiss also saw increased revenue, but higher costs and a drop in ticket prices weighed on profits. These fell 22% year-on-year in the first half to 278.7 million euros.

With about 8.5 million travelers, the Swiss carrier did manage to increase the number of visitors by 12.3% between January and June, although there remain problems with business flights—at 65 to 70% of the pre-pandemic level. Furthermore, the airline is also facing punctuality problems, which have decreased significantly since June, mainly due to weather phenomena such as storms and wind.

Swiss expects capacity to grow by nearly 10% over the previous year, reaching about 95% of 2019 by 2024.