SWISS sees its operating profit fall mid-year

The operating environment proved difficult, marked by geopolitical and trade tensions, SWISS said on Thursday. Keystone-SDA

SWISS Airlines saw its adjusted operating profit fall by more than a quarter in the first six months of the year, to CHF195.1 million ($240 million). Caution is called for in the second half of the financial year, the Lufthansa subsidiary said on Thursday.

In the first half of the year, operating income remained virtually stable at CHF2.69 billion, as did the number of passengers, at 8.5 million. Over 70,000 flights were operated, 1.8% more than in the previous year. The average load factor declined by 1.8 percentage points to 80%.

+Get the most important news from Switzerland in your inbox

In the second quarter alone, total operating revenue amounted to CHF1.47 billion, down 1.2% year-on-year.

The environment proved difficult, marked by geopolitical and trade tensions. “Rising costs, particularly for personnel and fees, also significantly affected our profitability. Structural constraints, such as persistent shortages of aircraft, engines and pilots, also weighed on our results”, CFO Dennis Weber is quoted as saying in a press release.

Demand from non-premium classes on transatlantic routes has weakened, with an immediate impact on average revenues.

On the positive side, the trend in fuel prices has been favourable. In addition, the airline was able to improve its punctuality, with 72.4% of flights taking off on time, up 3.9 percentage points on the first half of 2024. In the cargo segment, early deliveries of goods due to customs disputes underpinned performance.

+ SWISS cancels 1,400 summer flights due to pilot shortage

Caution is called for, both for the rest of the year and for 2026, as cost pressures continue and the environment remains unstable. “We are continuing to focus on cost control and targeted investment in stability, product quality and innovation,” said CEO Jens Fehlinger.

Translated from French with DeepL/gw

How we work

We select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools to translate them into English. A journalist then reviews the translation for clarity and accuracy before publication.  

Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles. The news stories we select have been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team from news agencies such as Bloomberg or Keystone.

If you have any questions about how we work, write to us at [e-mail].