Friday 01 May 2015 by Company updates

Virgin reports narrower third quarter loss

While improving performance over the corresponding quarter last year by $82.8m, Virgin still reported an underlying loss of $22.2m

Key points from the 3Q15 report:

    • Virgin reported an underlying loss for the quarter of $22.2m, representing an improvement of $82.8m on the  corresponding quarter last year after normalising for Tigerair Australia performance. Within the third quarter results were restructuring and transaction costs amounting to $17.8m
    • Overall, total revenue passengers are up for the quarter by 1.3% to 5.62m. While revenue passengers were down 2.2% in Virgin’s domestic business, this was more than offset by strong passenger growth in the international and Tigerair business segments
    • Virgin’s low cost carrier Tigerair Australia delivered a third-quarter profit of $0.5m, a solid turnaround on the $25m loss in the prior corresponding period. As noted above, Tigerair continues to show strong passenger growth, with revenue passengers up 17.5% on the prior corresponding quarter
    • The company announced that yields and unit costs were improved from the prior corresponding third quarter, both including and excluding fuel costs
    • The company did not report a quarterly EBITDA, however based on consensus analyst estimates the company is on track to deliver a FY15 EBITDA of $336m
    • While consumer sentiment remains subdued, Virgin is seeing a sustainable recovery in its domestic business. The international segment however continues to remain challenging