Singapore Airlines (SIA) has just posted the highest year-end profit and, as staff bonuses are proportional to the company’s financial results, employees could expect a nearly 8 months’ worth pay.
The city-state’s flag carrier revealed its balance sheet on 15 May, reporting a net profit of $2.67 billion. According to an email from CEO Goh Choon, seen by the Straits Times, this increases the employees’ bonuses from being equal to 6.65 months’ salary last year to 7.94 months’ salary this year. Last year, some of the staff also received an additional hand-out of 1.5 months’ salary for their work during the pandemic. No claims about a similar pay have been revealed for this year.
The Singapore Airlines Group revenue rose by 7.0% year-on-year, or $1.2 billion, to a record $19 billion. Despite a 41.2% decrease in revenue from the group’s cargo sector, the overall turnover was brought up by a $2.3 billion (17.3%) increase in revenue from passenger flights, which reached $15.7 billion, despite a 7.6% decline in passenger yields.
Despite the record profits, the airline said demand for air travel remained buoyant throughout FY2023/24, boosted however by a rebound in North Asia as China, Hong Kong, Japan and Taiwan fully reopened their borders. China and Singapore also implemented a mutual visa waver in February, further boosting travel between the two countries.
Overall, SIA and Scoot, the group’s low-cost subsidiary, carried a combined 36.4 million passengers, up 37.6% year-on-year. Passenger traffic grew 26.6%, outpacing the capacity expansion of 22.9%. As a result, the group passenger load factor (PLF) improved 2.6 percentage points to a record 88.0%, 87.1% for SIA and 91.2% for Scoot.
Building on a healthy demand for air travel in the first quarter of FY2024/25, supported by a strong pick up in forward bookings to North and Southeast Asia, the group expects passenger yields to continue to moderate over the next year due to increased capacity injection by airlines, especially in the Asia-Pacific region. With outbound travel from China yet to recover to full pre-Covid figures, SIA seems set for more records in the following year.
Moreover, a proposed merger of SIA subsidiary Vistara and Air India was approved in March and, once completed, will give the group a 25.1% stake in an enlarged Air India Group with a significant presence in all key Indian airline market segments, including domestic, international, full-service and low-cost.
