Wizz Air Holdings Plc ("Wizz Air"), the largest low-cost airline in Central and Eastern Europe, today issued a press release, presenting its financial statement for the F20 fiscal year, ending at 31 March 2020. I will not return your press release because some information is irrelevant, but I present a summary.
Wizz Air announced that March air traffic was down 34% compared to the same period last year. Currently, Wizz Air operates at 3% of total capacity.
Wizz Air at the time of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Q4 losses in F20 are 70-80 million EURO. And the net profit on F20 was reduced to 270-280 million EURO. At the end of March 2020, Wizz Air had an impressive liquidity reserve of EUR 1.5 billion.
Since the outbreak of the pandemic with the new coronavirus, Wizz Air has worked with various governments to provide repatriation flights to their citizens in Europe, Central Asia, North Africa and North America. Two Wizz Air aircraft flew to the US and Canada.
The company also operated a series of flights between China and Hungary to deliver supplies and medical equipment, with most orders coming from the Hungarian government.
Currently, Wizz Air is adjusting its operations in line with market demands and existing opportunities. In the long term, Wizz Air hopes to maintain its annual growth of 15%. Moreover, the company confirms that Wizz Air Abu Dhabi is making progress according to the initial plan.
Wizz Air works with suppliers to reduce contract rates and improve payment terms. In addition, Wizz Air confirms that it will gradually return 32 old aircraft by the end of F23, as existing leases expire.
Financial and operational information!
The workforce was also reduced by 19%, the equivalent of 1000 people. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Wizz Air has taken other measures to reduce labor costs. In F21, the salaries of pilots, flight attendants and ground staff will be reduced by an average of 14%. The remuneration of the general manager, the members of the board of directors and the aircraft commanders will be reduced by 22%.
Given the current situation, Wizz Air does not make predictions for F21. It is difficult to make estimates for the fiscal year 2020 - 2021. Depending on the evolution of the COVID-19 pandemic and travel restrictions, airlines may have a faster or slower restart. Given that Wizz Air has a large cash reserve, we expect it to get through the pandemic crisis more easily. But will there still be plane tickets at 10-20-50 EURO?
What about the reimbursements? Thousands of passengers complain that Wizz Air continued to operate certain flights while the pandemic with the new coronavirus escalated to those destinations. Even we have a delicate situation.
On April 3 we were supposed to travel to London, but I refused because the number of COVID-19 cases had exploded in the UK. Wizz Air was active and probably also operated. Unfortunately we could not request the reimbursement of the plane tickets or the vouchers 120%. I hope, however, that Wizz Air takes these situations into account and resolves favorably for passengers.