The SAS airline’s full-year results have been strongly affected by the corona pandemic. In one year, SAS lost NOK 10.6 billion before tax.
On Thursday morning, the airline published the results for the fourth quarter of the financial year.
The figures apply from November last year to October this year.
The airline’s result before tax ended at minus SEK 10.2 billion, which corresponds to about NOK 10.6 billion Norwegian kroner. The year before, SAS made a profit of NOK 794 million.
“Since the beginning of 2020, the coronavirus has changed the conditions for the entire aviation industry through the restrictions that have been introduced all over the world and the general travel disruptions that many people experience.
“Naturally, this also affects SAS, and the result for the quarter and the financial year has been strongly affected by the ongoing pandemic,” CEO Rickard Gustafson said in a press release.
Major fall in revenues
The airline’s revenues fell by 55%, from 46.1 billion last year to 20.5 billion this year. In the fourth quarter, revenues fell by 77% compared with the same quarter last year.
“SAS has just presented figures that are strongly affected by the pandemic and travel restrictions.
“Our revenues are down by more than 77%. Despite the fact that we have managed to halve the costs, we registered losses,” Executive Vice President of SAS in Norway Kjetil Håbjørg told Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK).
However, Håbjørg believes the company will be able to recover.
“We have carried out a financial restructuring and raised 12 billion kroner in the market. These are funds we will use to make it in a tough 2020 and 2021,” he told the channel.
Probably back by 2022
SAS CEO Gustavson believes that the aviation industry’s downturn will continue until 2022. Reaching the levels before COVID-19 will not happen until a few more years after that.
Aviation analyst Hans Jørgen Elnæs of WinAir agrees with Gustavson.
“I believe that the domestic flights in Norway and other countries in Scandinavia may be back in 2022, but those to and from Europe may take longer.
“For long-distance (flights), it looks very bleak. It could take up to 2024-25 to get back to the 2019 level,” Elnæs told Flysmart24.
© NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today
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