Wizz Air Holdings (LSE:WIZZ) has declined to issue full-year guidance for the financial year ahead, citing geopolitical uncertainty, despite expecting sharp capacity growth in the first two quarters.
The Budapest-based low-cost carrier anticipates available seat kilometres up 15% year-on-year in the first quarter and up 20% in the second, with seat growth of 25% and high-twenties percent respectively, load factor broadly flat in the first half, and ex-fuel cost per available seat kilometre flat to up low single digits.
Revenue per available seat kilometre is expected to be down mid-to-high single digits in the first quarter before returning to broadly flat in the second.
The cautious outlook follows a near-total collapse in annual net profit, which fell to €1.3 million for the year to 31 March from €213.9 million a year earlier, despite total revenue rising 8.0% to €5,691.4 million and EBITDA growing to €1,318.3 million.
Higher depreciation, maintenance costs and an adverse tax swing weighed on the result, with operating profit declining to €139.7 million from €167.5 million.
Wizz Air carried a record 69.7 million passengers during the year at a load factor of 90.7%.
The grounded fleet shrank to 30 aircraft at 31 March from 42 a year earlier, and stood at 24 as of 5 June as GTF engine inspections progressed.
Total cash increased 22.5% to €2,126.4 million and net debt eased marginally to €4,941.5 million, with leverage falling to 3.7 times net debt to EBITDA from 4.4 times after the repayment of a maturing €500 million bond in January.
The group also closed its Abu Dhabi base and wound down Vienna operations, reallocating capacity to its core Central and Eastern European markets.
