EasyJet announces lower half year losses

easyJet has reported it reduced its losses for the first half of 2012 by £41 million to £112 million despite an £87 million increase in its unit fuel costs. The low cost carrier attributed these results to careful allocation of capacity, revenue initiatives and tight control of costs, combined with exceptionally low levels of disruption compared to previous years. Seats flown grew by 3.5% and the average load factor improved by 1.5 percentage points, which it attributed to tighter market capacity,  improvements in revenue management, website initiatives and the ‘europe by easyJet’ marketing campaign. Meanwhile Passengers flown grew by 5.4% to 25.2 million. Commenting on the results, Carolyn McCall, easyJet chief executive said: “In the first six months of the year easyJet has continued to deliver improvements in customer satisfaction, operational, and financial performance. We have also returned £196 million to our shareholders. “The economic environment remains uncertain, and the aviation industry faces headwinds such as the recent increase in UK APD. “However, easyJet’s strategy of low fares and our focus on making it easy for our customers, aligned with tight cost management and strictly managed allocation of capital, ensures that easyJet is well positioned to deliver good results for shareholders.”