SWISS turnover and profit hits turbulence

Swiss 2025 on the decline again Keystone-SDA

After record sales in 2024, Swiss International Air Lines (SWISS) saw numbers fall again last year. Turnover dropped by 2.6% to CHF5.5 billion ($7 billion), the airline said on Friday.

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Operating profit plummeted by 26.6% to CHF502.2 million.

“High competitive pressure, volatile demand and rising fees and maintenance costs have left their mark on our result,” explained CFO Dennis Weber in the press release. The cargo business also fell short of the previous year’s level, as SWISS was affected to an above-average extent by geopolitical uncertainties.

On the other hand, lower fuel prices were a relief and supported the result.

Aircraft on the ground

The airline also had to contend with operational bottlenecks. “Specifically, SWISS lacked both available engines and crews. As a result, aircraft were grounded for longer than planned or could not be deployed as planned,” it said. As a result, the airline was only partially able to realise the planned fleet growth and was unable to expand capacity as planned.

The headwind was particularly strong in the final quarter: operating profit halved to CHF91 million. Meanwhile, sales fell by 5.2% to CHF1.33 billion.

To counter rising costs, SWISS has taken structural measures in 2025. “These include a company-wide cost-cutting programme,” wrote the Lufthansa subsidiary.

SWISS wants to streamline its structures and become more efficient in the long term, explained CEO Jens Fehlinger. “An airline that shrinks instead of growing loses competitiveness. We are determined to consolidate our position again. Our goal is clear: SWISS should grow profitably again. We are laying the foundations for this in 2026.”

Punctuality improved

Despite all the problems, SWISS was able to improve its punctuality: it increased by 4.1 percentage points to 69.3% on average over the year. This means that the airline did not quite achieve its annual punctuality target of 70%.

Nevertheless, flight schedule stability improved by just under one percentage point to 98%. “This progress is the result of targeted measures,” it said.

The airline carried a total of 18.1 million passengers last year. This was 0.6% more than in the previous year. The number of flights also rose by 0.6% to over 143,000.

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Adapted from German by AI/ts

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