PARIS – Air France-KLM said on Thursday that the coronavirus pandemic “severely impacted” its earnings in 2020, pushing it deep into a net loss of €7.1 billion (RM34.74 billion).
The previous year, the Franco-Dutch airline had booked a bottom-line profit of €290 million.
“2020 tested the Air France-KLM group with the most severe crisis ever experienced by the air transport industry,” said chief executive officer Benjamin Smith in a statement.
The airline said group revenues plunged by nearly 60% to €11.1 billion as passenger numbers plummeted 67% to €28.8 million.
Furthermore, there was no sign of an immediate improvement for the sector, it said.
“After a positive Christmas... travel restrictions were tightened in France, the Netherlands and worldwide, having a negative impact on traffic in the first quarter of 2021,” the statement said.
“Due to the lockdown and travel restrictions still in place, the group anticipates a challenging first quarter of 2021,” it continued.
“There is limited visibility on the demand recovery curve as customer booking behaviour is much more short-term oriented and also highly dependent on the imposed travel restrictions,” Air France-KLM said. – AFP, February 20, 2021
