Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Q3 2024 Results Analyst Conference Call and live webcast. I'm Moritz, the call operator. I would like to remind you that all participants will be in a listen-only mode, and the conference is being recorded. The presentation will be followed by a question and answer session. You can register for questions at any time by pressing star and one on your telephone.
For operator assistance, please press star and zero. The conference must not be recorded for publication or broadcast. At this time, it's my pleasure to hand over to Marc- Dominic Nettesheim, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much, and also from my end, very warm welcome to all of you. Happy to have you here to our third quarter results presentation. With me today are Carsten Spohr, our CEO, and our new CFO, Till Streichert, and they will both guide you through what happened in Q3, main results and the outlook for the rest of the year. As mentioned before, there will be a Q&A session at the end. We ask you to limit yourselves to two questions so that everybody has a chance to participate. And with that, I hand over to you, Carsten.
Yeah, Marc, thank you very much, and warm welcome on my behalf as well, and that's also on behalf of my new colleague, Till, who I've now had the pleasure of working with for a few weeks. And the two of us, as mentioned by Marc, will do our very best after a short introduction to answer your questions, whatever topic you are raising them regard to.
You all have been in this industry probably for some time, so you are well aware, like us, that in aviation, we have always mastered ups and downs. Is it market changes, the increased operational demands, political conditions which are changing, or especially in the last month, of course, global uncertainties? These all require us to be flexible and decisive. And I think this year, 2024, is no exception. Just think about the Near East situation alone.
But it also shows, once again, that we have set the right strategic course for profitable growth in the future being set in the past. So that's why I would like to start with focusing on three points today. First, the fact that the global demand is quite intact and continues to grow, and not only were we able to fully sell our significant growth this year, but we also increased the seat load factor to new record levels.
And however, it once again also became clear that the global air traffic system is currently at the limit of its operational capacity, and that is not always to the pleasure of our customers, and also the long-term effect for new aircraft demand probably will be that these demands cannot be met for many, many years to come.
In the end, all this will lead to a healthy balance between supply and demand in the years to come, and in addition, I think also, especially for us in the Lufthansa Group, this will also result in healthy demand for MRO. Sorry for some technical problems here. Sorry, just a second.
Okay, we continue. So this will, in my view, also have a positive impact on Lufthansa Technik's outlook, because basically, missing aircraft will partly, but only partly, be replaced by older aircraft flying, which will require additional MRO activities around the world. And you add to this quite positive outlook on air freight, and you know why we are presenting here in a quite optimistic tone today. Second pillar of my introduction is the fact that, on the one hand, the Lufthansa Group is remaining on course for our economic success.
We are able to fulfill our financial targets, which we have shown to you before. But at the Lufthansa brand, core brand especially, we do see external and also internal factors challenging also our financial success, which we'll come back to in a few minutes. And last but not least, on the third pillar, it is our conviction that by further strengthening our strategy and our implementation of our strategy, we will enhance our role as Europe's number one.
On the other hand, the fact that we are European also means that we continue to face regulatory challenges and disadvantages others around the world don't have. But let's look first at our third quarter results. We have achieved, as a group, a revenue of EUR 10.7 billion, which is an increase of 5% compared to the previous year.
As a matter of fact, it's the strongest revenue we ever have seen in the history of our company for one quarter. By this, we achieved an adjusted EBIT of EUR 1.3 billion in the third quarter, and we have done that partly by increasing the number of available seat kilometers by 6% compared to the previous year.
Quite some less growth than we expected to be able to produce, which probably helped for a certain amount, stabilizing the CASK, sorry, the RASK development, especially over the last weeks. We'll come back to that, but for the first time in history, we have in August achieved a load factor of more or less 88%, and we have welcomed more than 40 million people on board in just the third quarter alone.
We see that customers, and that's, I think, important also for the long-term outlook in almost all our global markets, tend to spend a higher proportion of their income on travel, and that's, in our view, another indication of the stable market outlook for the entire industry for the years to come. The pressure on yields, as just mentioned, has somewhat stabilized in the recent weeks and months.
Also, on the other hand, when it comes to the cost side, irregularities, for example, due to weather conditions or bottlenecks in European air traffic control, cost us approximately EUR 240 million in just the third quarter. Overall, as mentioned, we believe we are on track to meet our overall financial targets. All our passenger airlines achieved positive results in the third quarter, but three of them, Austrian, Brussels, and Eurowings, were even able to post record results.
Also, Lufthansa Cargo and Lufthansa Technik developed quite positively as expected, while the cargo business is very much driven by China. The keyword is e-commerce here. That's why we have shifted cargo freighter capacity from the transatlantic to Asia to take full advantage of that healthy market development out of China. However, the situation at the core brand, Lufthansa Airlines, remained tense also in the third quarter.
It again earned less than the previous year, and it's not only because of its size and strategic importance that this trend must and will be reversed. Lufthansa Airlines is obviously our core business. It's our core brand and has a revenue share of more than 40%, therefore, the most important airline by far in our group, also in economic terms.
The negative Adjusted EBIT of the Lufthansa Airlines in the last nine months shows the importance of the turnaround program, which is mainly focusing on efficiency, and it has been launched and will be required for the future viability of this brand in our portfolio. Till Streichert will get back to that with more details in a few minutes.
But there's also some external factors, such as delayed aircraft deliveries or operational challenges, especially at our hubs, Frankfurt and Munich, which are hitting Lufthansa Airlines and Lufthansa CityLine particularly hard. In addition to these external difficulties, nevertheless, there are also internal structural problems and especially efficiency challenges, and improving these is crucial and is where the turnaround program has its focus on. Let's speak a little bit about premium.
I think customer satisfaction to be raised with the new Allegris product on the intercontinental cabin side was clearly in our view, but we are very happy to see those expectations being exceeded with the flights we have already been operating. In mid-October, we were now finally able to take delivery of the first Airbus A350 , including the new first class. We are now in the fine-tuning process and wait for the official approval by the German authorities, and we'll be able to take the aircraft into the skies with passengers in just a few days.
By the end of the year, we expect to have two more of these A350 s with Allegris in all four travel classes in our possession, even more to come in early 2025 with three, and also in 2025, we'll be starting to put the first class into those airplanes, which were already delivered without them over the last weeks.
That will be a significant, I think, improvement of our premium offer. Keyword operations. I think it's obvious in our industry, it's our employees, be it at the airport or in the cabin, in the cockpit, or on the ground or in the hangars, who make the Lufthansa Group unique, and in the end, guarantee our premium positioning. At the airline alone, Lufthansa Airlines alone, we have recruited more than five thousand six hundred new colleagues in the last eighteen months.
Another number, which is, I think, remarkable, is that over the last four years after COVID, we have recruited 40,000 people out of 100,000 total staff newly into the Lufthansa Group, including the challenges that creates in training, in licensing, and so on. But in the end, this is an investment into our future, into stabilizing our operations with additional people, and it's obviously something we are focusing on doing as well as we can.
When it comes to growth, beyond hiring new people, it's important to mention Lufthansa City Airlines. Our newest airline has commenced flight operations and will now increasingly contribute to ensuring that our important feeder and outbound flights for our hubs, again, cover their costs and become profitable. There's on top growth, significant growth in Brussels Airlines, in Edelweiss, and Discover Airlines.
Both Brussels and Discover will receive additional aircraft and modernize their long-haul cabins as early as over the next years. In Edelweiss, we even already take delivery of newly configured Airbus A350s this spring of 2025. While Till will explain the turnaround measures in detail in a few minutes, I would like to highlight the important level of automation and digitalization just for a few minutes.
We took a strategic decision some time ago to create a dedicated area for digital innovations in the Lufthansa Group, so-called Digital Hangar. That decision is paying off. Our app, which is compatible with all hub airlines and developed with identical functionality from a single source for all the hub airlines, has just been named the best airline app in the world at the World Aviation Festival.
That, I think, makes us proud, considering that we were probably saving a little bit too much on investments in this term when it came to the years of COVID. We're now nicely catching up and are leading the pack from the front. The number of daily users has doubled since 2023 alone. One in two customers book their flights through the app.
One in four requests are now managed digitally, and the app booking, booking, sorry, the bookings through the app are growing at eight times as fast the rate as our website bookings. More than 40% of digital check-ins are now made through the app. More than 80 features make travel more convenient, and also importantly, we now integrated our Miles & More frequent flyer program, so users can now book award flights directly in the app.
Usually IT services, especially internal IT services, are sometimes considered uneconomical or difficult, at least to judge. In our case, that's not so. The Digital Hangar activates, generates cost savings over a year, which easily cover the cost of we invest there, and I think it's one of the most profitable things and ideas we have probably implemented over the last years.
But in the end, it's not only about investing into digital technologies and tools, it's also, of course, about investing into aircraft and new cabin interiors to, first of all, improve customer satisfaction, but let's be honest, also needed for long-term profitability. That brings me to a recurring topic that the entire industry is suffering from, the ongoing delivery problems at the aircraft manufacturers, Airbus and Boeing.
In the Lufthansa Group alone, we are currently waiting for 41 aircraft just from Boeing, aircraft that should be flying by now, and by that, we actually, in the core brand, miss more Boeing aircraft than we currently operate, and that gives you a dimension of our problem, which on top comes at a very critical time in our largest fleet modernization ever, so over the next few years, we face the most fundamental fleet transformation in our history.
We have 250 new aircraft on our order list. Each, as you know, uses about 30% less fuel and emits 30% less CO₂. So this is also so important because in the end, new, more fuel-efficient aircraft and engines are the most effective lever for reducing CO₂ emissions, at least in our industry.
This will require record investments, and our investment grade rating will help us to do so, but it will also require a major operational effort, which we know is well worth it, because in the end, this will allow us to reduce fuel emissions and maintenance costs significantly. It will lower the complexity by strictly harmonizing our fleet, and at the same time, it will allow us to modernize our cabin interiors to take our premium offering to a new level.
Ladies and gentlemen, we know that the success of all of our efforts to improve premium quality and customer experience in the end depend on the operational stability of our flight operations. And that's why we again, stepping up here with additional reserves by extending connecting times and by relieving transfer hubs during daily peak periods.
We're doing everything we can to further increase our stability in the coming months and especially this coming summer. That's not only required for passenger convenience, but also will require significant reductions of our irreg costs. And in the end, we are convinced that our strategy is strengthening our resilience to the various challenges in the industry by first, consistently focusing on our core business airlines, including cargo, and of course, strategically developing Lufthansa Technik, by the way, including additional defense business.
And as mentioned, by successfully implementing this turnaround program and in parallel, the largest fleet organization ever, we will be creating a stable base for sustainable and profitable growth. Second, we're positioning ourselves more internationally to become less dependent on our home markets, not only on demand, but we already are below 25%, but also on the production side.
And third, we are obviously making every effort, as mentioned, to consistently live up to our premium standards and deliver on our quality promise to our guests every day, be it summer or winter. So I will now hand over to Till, who will present our figures in more detail, give you an update on the Lufthansa Airlines efficiency program, which we call Turnaround, and also introduce his own topics for the coming weeks and months, which we are looking forward to work together. Thank you for right now.
Thank you, Carsten, for the kind introduction and a warm welcome to all of you. Having joined Lufthansa Group six weeks ago, today's announcement of the third quarter results will be the beginning of what I hope a very close dialogue with you, our shareholders, analysts, and other stakeholders of the Lufthansa Group.
I look forward to being personally in touch with you in the next few weeks and months, but would like to use this opportunity today to already share with you some of my impressions and thoughts. But first things first, so let's begin by taking a look at the results of the past quarter. Our revenues in the third quarter reached EUR 10.7 billion, a 4.5% increase compared to the prior year, and making it the strongest quarter in terms of revenues in the history of Lufthansa Group.
The increase was driven by 6% capacity growth in our airline business, as well as revenue growth at Lufthansa Technik. Operating expenses in the quarter grew by 6.3%, mainly due to higher personnel costs, higher fees and charges, as well as higher expenses for aircraft maintenance. In summary, our Adjusted EBIT decreased by around 9% and amounted to 1.34 billion EUR. Adjusted Free Cash Flow was clearly positive at 128 million EUR, but significantly lower than last year, which I'll explain shortly.
In our passenger airline segment, the capacity offered in the quarter amounted to around 94% of pre-crisis levels, which is a six percentage point increase compared to the prior year, and slightly below our original expectation of 96% for the quarter.
Thereby, capacity growth slowed meaningfully compared to the double digit year-on-year growth of the prior quarters, as the post-COVID capacity ramp up levels off. When it comes to yields, which overall have declined by 3.5%, we observed a mixed performance across different traffic regions, whereas continental yields remained more or less stable compared to prior year.
Yields on the transatlantic turned out to be about 5% weaker than last year, mainly driven by a decrease in non-premium fares, which was partially compensated through stronger load factors. Asia Pacific was especially challenging, with yields down almost 14% versus 2023, due to strong competition, especially from Chinese carriers. The yield decline was partially offset by an improvement in seat load factor, which increased by one percentage point versus last year, reaching 87.2%.
In summary, RASK declined by 2.7%. As mentioned, especially on the transatlantic, we achieved a higher seat load factor of plus 2.5 percentage points versus prior year. Due to the lower year-on-year capacity expansion, as well as cost increases in personnel fees, charges, and MRO expenses, CASK increased by 4.5% in the quarter.
The adjusted EBIT of the passenger airline segment overall amounted to 1.2 billion EUR in the quarter, a 14% decrease versus 2023. Looking at the individual businesses within the segment, it becomes clear that Lufthansa Airlines is facing challenges, while the other passenger airlines are performing strongly. For Austrian Airlines, Brussels Airlines, and Eurowings, the third quarter was even the best quarter in their respective histories.
Lufthansa Airlines, on the other hand, delivered an adjusted EBIT of approximately EUR 400 million, which is a decrease of over 36% compared to last year. The underperformance to the other airline businesses is driven by lower capacity recovery and especially high cost pressure, resulting from missing deliveries of new aircraft, high maintenance and irreg cost, and significantly lower crew productivity measured in crew block hours per crew FTE, which remains still 13% under the pre-crisis level.
At the same time, Lufthansa Airlines has been especially affected by changes on the demand side. This is largely due to its high exposure to the German market, which is heavily affected by high regulatory costs and thereby lagging in recovery, and its relatively high capacity share to Asia, which holds long-term potential, but is only recovering slowly, with rising capacity and price pressure.
Additionally, the airline's higher share of corporate travelers, a clear strength pre-crisis, has recovered much slower, with resulting impact on demand structures and yields. To address these structural challenges, Lufthansa Airlines has initiated a comprehensive turnaround program targeting at boosting efficiency, reducing complexity, and improving quality to make the airline fit for the future.
Key elements of the plan include: optimizing the network, shifting more short-haul traffic and growth to more cost-efficient AOCs, closing productivity gaps in operations versus 2019, and increasing flexibility through digitalization and automation. In addition, once our wide-body fleet harmonization is concluded with a much higher new technology share, many inefficiencies in the system will automatically disappear, respectively, be reduced.
While not all the details have been completely worked out yet, we anticipate that this program to deliver already benefits from inception, with a total positive gross effect on adjusted EBIT of up to EUR 1.5 billion by 2026. Over the full course of its project tenure or timeline, the program is expected to contribute an adjusted EBIT effect of up to EUR 2.5 billion by 2028.
About one-third of the targeted improvements will come from revenue measures and two-thirds from cost reductions. The revenue uplift foresees upselling potential, thanks to a more elevated premium offer and an increased focus on ancillary sales. For example, a more personalized and context-related offering of advanced seat reservations, bag charges, or upgrades.
The cost reductions imply a rigorous streamlining of the organization towards less complexity and higher productivity, both for ground, admin, as well as flight operations. Measures include actions such as consistent, continuous automation of check-in and ground processes, GenAI usage in crew planning and maintenance planning topics, also data-driven analysis for fuel-efficient flight operations, flight planning, departure and arrival procedures, as well as simplification of collective labor agreements to enable higher productivity for flight crews.
The turnaround program is a critical step towards ensuring Lufthansa Airlines remains competitive and well-positioned for future growth, and that is why I'm devoting my attention to this issue, and we, as the executive board, have made it one of our top priorities. Now, let's look at the performance of the other segments.
First, Lufthansa Cargo profits picked up significantly compared to prior year, and this was driven by strong demand from Asia Pacific and the gradual recovery in global air freight demand caused by the reduction in inventories as a result of the diminishing global supply chain difficulties. Generally, freight yields have remained strong throughout the past quarters for us and are still more than 40% above pre-crisis level.
Given these developments, we look confidently ahead to the Q4 peak season for our cargo business. Looking at Lufthansa Technik, results were on par with the prior record year level, with an adjusted EBIT of 167 million EUR. Revenues increased by 9%, reflecting the strong demand for MRO services, and at the same time, we observed significant cost inflation in material cost, cost for external services and staff cost.
Finally, the other segment, which includes smaller companies within our group, as well as our central administrative functions, reported an adjusted EBIT of 10 million EUR. The improvement to prior year was mainly driven by lower project expenses and some favorable foreign exchange rate effects. Let's look at our cash flow. Adjusted free cash flow in the first nine months of this year amounted to 1 billion EUR, driven by a robust booking intake for the summer season, as well as improved working capital and net CapEx.
Net capital expenditures amounted to around 2.2 billion EUR, a reduction of around 10% compared to the prior year, due to a different phasing of investments. The majority of investments related to fleet modernization, including prepayments, as well as delivery payments for 11 aircraft in the first nine months.
Adjusted free cash flow for the quarter amounted to EUR 128 million, which was significantly lower than previous year due to the lower operating result, as well as higher tax payments and a year-on-year decline from working capital. And as with all M&A transactions, the purchase price of EUR 450 million received during the quarter from the successfully concluded sale of AirPlus is not included in the adjusted free cash flow.
Our financial position improved in the third quarter. Available liquidity is still above our target range, with EUR 11.4 billion, supported by the positive adjusted free cash flow. Maturing liabilities were successfully refinanced through bond placements in the second and the third quarter, with a total volume of EUR 1.75 billion.
Available liquidity and net debt were additionally positively impacted by the EUR 450 million disposal proceeds from the AirPlus transaction. Compared to the beginning of the year, net debt declined, supported by the positive free cash flow contribution and a slight decrease in net pension liability. These reductions have favorably impacted our leverage ratio, now standing at 1.9 times, including pensions.
Let me now update you on our fuel cost expectations. The decrease in the price for kerosene in the past months demonstrated that our option-based hedging strategy is beneficial in case of price declines. These decreases lead to an expected tailwind of about EUR 300 million regarding our fuel bill in 2024, of which slightly above EUR 100 million have been realized.
Overall, we now expect our fuel bill to amount to 7.8 billion EUR in 2024, with a hedge ratio of 83% for 2024 and approximately 70% for 2025. We are effectively protected against the risk of rising prices, including potential impacts from an escalation of the conflict in the Middle East. Ladies and gentlemen, the booking outlook for the winter months gives us confidence as we continue to observe a solid demand environment.
During the next two months, capacity growth in terms of offered seats is expected to be limited to around 2% year on year. At the same time, we see an increase in bookings of over 6%. This shows that we are able to sell additional capacity in the market. This trend is also continuing in the first quarter of 2025.
At the same time, our capacity is growing less strongly than in the second quarter. This should have a stabilizing effect on the yields. For the full year 2024, we now expect to reach an average of 91% of our 2019 capacity, a slight decline to our prior guidance of 92%. The adjustment results from the slightly lower than expected capacity level in Q3, as well as a further focus on yield stabilization in Q4.
For unit revenues, we now expect a mid-single-digit percentage point decline versus prior year. CASK ex fuel and emissions cost is expected to increase within a low single digit range versus prior year. Overall, we thereby confirm our adjusted EBIT guidance range of 1.4-1.8 billion EUR for the full year 2024.
The result of the fourth quarter will be still dependent on the further development of demand, especially in the core season of Lufthansa Cargo, as well as external factors, such as geopolitical developments. Adjusted Free Cash Flow is still expected to be significantly below 1 billion EUR and is expected to develop in line with the operating results.
Now, as promised, at the beginning of my presentation, I would like to share with you some early observations and give you my thoughts on strategic directions. Let me begin by saying, Lufthansa Group is an iconic company, which has been a strong leader in the industry in its nearly 100-year history. With its strong home markets, distinct local brands, and multi-hub expertise on the airline side, and the strong cargo and MRO business, I believe the company is well-positioned to shape the future of aviation also going forward.
It has a strong balance sheet, as also confirmed by our unanimous investment grade rating. It has a high-quality asset base. One example for that is, of course, Lufthansa Technik, and as a world market leader in our growing industry, with a highly skilled workforce and a clear growth trajectory, Lufthansa Technik is, in my view, uniquely positioned, and here we are looking forward to providing you with more insights at our capital market day in December.
Furthermore, as you are all aware, we are optimistic to complete the acquisition of ITA in the next few months, and thereby add another attractive home market and a more southern hub to our portfolio as an access point to further growth regions such as South America.
With its successful track record of integrating strong brands into our ranks, Lufthansa Group has shown that its multi-hub strategy allows strong brands to thrive while achieving significant synergies behind the curtain. At the same time, and that brings me to my third point, of course, my focus is very clear. We will be very focused on profitability and cash flow generation, and after a very successful year, 2023, the results for 2024 is not where we want and need it to be.
While many of our business units will deliver profitable growth also this year, as mentioned before, the Lufthansa Airlines business is fighting significant headwinds. I have no doubt that the turnaround program is key in returning the group to the profitability targets we continue to set ourselves.
I and the entire executive team are very much involved here already, and I expect that we will see first benefits in 2024, gradually ramping up into 2026. But it will, of course, take time for all measures to unfold their full potential. The improved profitability will, of course, also support the cash flow development, which will be a prerequisite to keep investing into growth and in particular, into the necessary fleet renewal.
For these future investments, we need to be prudent on capital allocation and make sure we spend our money on the fields that will benefit us the most for the future. And as Carsten has highlighted before, we are excited to continue with the renewal of our fleet, which will require significant investment.
The renewal is a crucial part of our strategy, as it will enable us to improve the product, increase fuel efficiency, and reduce unit cost. In addition, we intend to invest into further digitalization in customer touchpoints, ensuring further revenue growth and satisfied customers, but also through applying state-of-the-art technology to further optimizing our operations.
Let me also be clear, it is my clear goal to deliver attractive shareholder returns over time, and given what we expect in relation to our 2024 results, we intend to distribute a dividend in 2025, in line with our current dividend policy. And with that, I've come to a close of my part, and Carsten and I are now looking forward to your questions.
Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their telephone. You will hear a tone to confirm that you have entered the queue. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two.
Questioners on the phone are requested to disable the loudspeaker mode and eventually turn off the volume from the webcast while asking a question. Please limit yourself to two questions only. Anyone who has a question may press star and one at this time. One moment for the first question, please. And the first question comes from Jamie Rowbotham from Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.
Morning, gentlemen, and welcome, Till. So two from me. On slide 18, you talk about the strong demand environment for the remaining winter months. How would you characterize that demand, please? Where is it strongest? Where is it weakest? Perhaps you could differentiate a bit by airline, so maybe Eurowings versus Swiss versus Lufthansa, for example.
And secondly, could I ask you to talk a little bit about the twenty twenty-five outlook, please? I'm interested in your capacity plans, the rate of your 70% fuel hedge, and how much of the Lufthansa turnaround measures you think can be realized next year. Thanks.
Thanks. Thanks for the question. Let me start off with the second one. It's a bit too early to comment on twenty twenty-five outlook at that stage. Also because I'm obviously just around for a few weeks, and therefore, I'm working through the outlook and the plans that we've got for next year.
What I can tell you in relation to the turnaround program, as I said, I do expect already positive contribution in twenty twenty-five, but quantifying that is something that I would only reach clarity and visibility when we talk kind of more towards February in our full year results presentation, where we also give customarily a more comprehensive outlook for what we expect for the full year.
To your first question, again, we've got solid demand, which we see. Here, obviously, a slight, kind of, I would say, fine-tuning in terms of the dynamics. Seats on the one hand side growing well, yield decline, you've seen that as well in the third quarter, was starting to stabilize. This is something which we would like to continue seeing also in the fourth quarter.
The demand, as such, is driven by leisure and premium classes. For November, we've sold about 70%, for December, 55%. The continental business remains strong. Eurowings indeed on a strong trend, but generally, all airlines are actually doing well, except for obviously the known issue on the Lufthansa airline side.
Okay, thanks very much.
And then the next question comes from James Hollins from BNP Paribas. Please go ahead.
Thanks very much, and hi, Till, hi, Carsten. I'm just going to follow on from Jamie's questions, actually, which is probably quite annoying, but I'm going to do it anyway. So the turnaround program, obviously, you talked about EUR 1.5 billion higher in 2026. Is that one where we just map EUR 1.5 billion as a total quantum for the year? Or is this one of those ones where you're talking about a run rate of EUR 1.5 billion some point in 2026? I'd just like to get a clarification on that.
And then secondly, I think, look, I know you're going to talk a bit more about Lufthansa capacity, and it's clearly slightly in the hands of Boeing, and that's not very helpful. But you're. I think Lufthansa itself, I'm talking about Lufthansa Airlines capacity, is running about 87% of 2019 levels. Can you maybe just give a range, a feel, some sort of sense of how that might look for 2025 as a whole? Thank you.
Let me take the first question just on the turnaround, respectively, efficiency program that we are targeting. The 1.5 billion EUR is basically a measure volume. This is basically a contribution which we aim to achieve for 2026 already. As I said, I expect it's kind of a ramp-up, which starts already in 2025, positive contribution, 1.5 billion EUR in 2026. Once we have completed and we are now looking at a timeline of about 2028, I would estimate the contribution to be about 2.5 billion EUR as such.
Let me also say, which is always important, this is basically a gross measure volume of this program, so you would obviously have as well the underlying trends in terms of cost increases. Therefore, that is always something that you need to consider when you then build up your kind of, your model or your expectations going forward. The second question on Lufthansa Airlines. What was the second question? It was about the capacity. You will take that?
I'll take one, yeah. Yeah, James, it's Carsten. So overall, obviously... Sorry?
Yeah.
If I get your question right, the overall capacity, as you know, is, will be 95% for the Lufthansa Group. For the Lufthansa Airlines Classic, as we call it, the core, without City Airlines and without Discover, it will only be 84%, which shows the significant impact we will see with Discover and City Airlines adding to that. So it shows the obviously strategy which we follow.
The less profitable we are, the slower we grow, and therefore Lufthansa Airlines will be at the lower end of our growth. But the hub system, frankly, in Munich, of course, you have to add Discover and City Airlines to it, and you come to more or less the same level of capacity as we have in the group.
Maybe also to the question, well, maybe one comment also to the question before, maybe because you asked for different outlooks for capacity and demand for Swiss and Lufthansa. We don't look at it that way anymore when it comes to demand, because we are now incorporating our hubs in a way, and that's maybe an interesting number, that 80% of our connecting intercontinental passengers can already pursue their destination by more than one hub. And that goes up to 10% of our passengers, who can even use all five hubs to get to their connecting destination.
So we are really now able to steer the demand, which of course is the base for that, through more than one of our hubs, most cases, two or three. That's why there is no such thing as an individual demand situation for Swiss or Austria anymore, because basically, the way we look at markets is a group perspective, and then we make sure we steer it through the hubs in the most popular way. Maybe that's part of the answer to the first two question. Sorry.
Yeah, useful. Thank you.
The next question comes from Jarrod from UBS. Please go ahead.
Good morning, everyone, and welcome to. Again, just focusing a little bit on cost, going into twenty twenty-five. Any color you can give in terms of conversations with suppliers, what they're pushing for, especially, you know, some of your hub airports, and how those are going and, you know, potentially how things could move around to put some pressure on them if it's not going your way?
And then, just in terms of air freight, it's obviously going quite well, but, you know, wanted to just kind of hear your comments on, you know, potentially tariffs increase in the U.S., potentially de minimis disappearing in Europe by twenty twenty-eight.
You know, obviously, becoming lower in the U.S., probably less of an impact for you. But you know, the de minimis changing in 2028 in Europe, how are you thinking about that? And you know, where are you going to replace the volumes if, you know, the consumer side of your business takes a hit? Thanks.
Yeah, Jarrod, on the suppliers, obviously, airports are always maybe the most challenging one in this regard. It's no secret that Frankfurt Airport is our most expensive hub, and it's also the one who has increased charges the most in 2024 and is looking at doing something in 2025 and future years, which is the reason why we grow the least in Frankfurt, and grow strongest in those airports, for example, Zurich, which are looking at less cost raises.
So this is definitely an input into our multi-hub system, if that was the background of your question. And goes nicely hand in hand with my answer before, with being able to steer traffic via more than one hub, up to all five hubs, because we can now leverage our negotiating power with our airports. On the very specific case of Frankfurt, we are also in talks with the government of Hesse, who has to approve the cap, the charge increases of Frankfurt Airport, and we are hopefully looking for a compromise here.
With Munich, historically, the cooperation is the closest and the best. We have some operational issues there, which we will jointly tackle now, but when it comes to cost increases, I think Munich Airport and us are jointly understanding that the cost of hubbing is what puts us also in competition with other hubs outside of our system, and I'm optimistic to find the right solutions there, and especially after now, the governor of Bavaria has announced that there will be a COO position installed. I think also the quality will improve, and we were appreciating to hear that signal.
On air traffic going well, and you ask, especially on the U.S. situation, it's maybe important for you to know that we hardly have freighters anymore to and from the U.S. We, with increased belly capacities, we mainly now focus on bellies to and from the U.S. We still have some freighter operation, but as mentioned in my opening remarks, we are shifting our freighters more and more towards Asia Pacific, especially to China, where the yields are highest out of China, but also Vietnam is an interesting place.
More and more charter business now we're able to sign in China because the demand for e-commerce is so strong out of China, and there's a gap for capacity, that this becomes the most important part of our cargo business, where we can allocate capacity with the freighters and belly. Obviously, we take whatever is there.
Okay, thanks.
And the next question comes from Alex Irving, from Bernstein. Please go ahead.
Hi, good morning, gentlemen. Hope all is well. First question is on your EUR 1.5 billion turnaround. Thinking about this a different way, how much depends on underlying change versus other factors, right? Specifically, how much of that EUR 1.5 billion is non-reoccurrence of strikes from this year? How much is the direct impact of new aircraft, lower fuel burn, and so on? And how much is the underlying like-for-like process change?
Second question, on that same slide, you talk about retail and ancillary revenue as a source of improvement. Do you already have the right technology infrastructure to achieve this, or do you need further meaningful technological change here, please? Thank you.
So, in terms of turnaround contribution for 2026, as you said, we are targeting the EUR 1.5 billion within the year. There's no kind of offset to the strike contribution, so the strike is obviously a different event that happened this year. I think that's the answer to the first point. The second one is, in fact, the idea and the target of that program is to improve on a structural basis. As you know, when you look at the KPIs, and we've spoken about that in terms of productivity gaps that we still face versus 2019, in our crew productivity.
When you think about the inefficiencies that we are incurring and additional costs from MRO, et cetera, et cetera, these things are all addressed through the levers of the turnaround program to improve in a structural way, the output, the productivity that we have. Is
... Is within that program, fuel renewal, baked in? Here, I need to give you a slightly differentiated answer. On the cost side, no. So when you think of fuel or fuel savings or MRO savings, this lever would actually come as the new aircraft arrive. On the revenue side, it's true. The improved product will obviously have a dependency on the fleet renewal, and we're going to support what we are targeting here as revenue uplift, ancillary revenue s, et cetera.
Yeah, on the ancillary revenues, maybe it's we all know the Lufthansa here is below our competitors, but that's not for system gaps, but rather for our understanding of the premium product, has probably kept us in a more conservative position. What are we charging extra for, and what are we including in our rates, which tend to be a little bit higher than other airlines? But I think that we see a slow shift in this.
The lower you go in our base structure, the more ancillaries we are now able to achieve, because we are becoming more aggressive, let's put it that way, commercially, to charge extra. But a huge impact we'll see on the new Allegris. You probably know that we have seven different business class seats which we are installing. Only one of them will be basically base priced.
The others will be requiring additional surcharges by our customers, be it sitting in a double seat with somebody else, be it having an office suite around you, be it in a completely closed cabin. So we'll be, I think, starting in the spring of 2025, see new extra revenue streams on business class, where historically, of course, we had none. We also just recently increased our seat reservation fees, also in economy class.
So I think we are becoming, let's say, more aggressive on this. When it comes to the system side, we are continually investing. But again, our gap, you see to others, is more driven by our, let's call it, philosophy towards the market than by our system capabilities, and we'll see that changing as part of turnaround as well.
All right. Thank you.
And the next question comes from Harry Gowers from J.P. Morgan. Please go ahead.
Hey, good morning, both. Carsten and Till. First one was just on your slide 18 on the demand environment into winter. Appreciate the color on November and December, but maybe you could give us a little bit of color on how October develops in terms of yield and load factor and RASK for the month of October.
And then on the second question, just on the Lufthansa turnaround figures, the EUR 1.5 billion number by 2026. I appreciate this is obviously a gross number. Any color at all on what the net number might end up being? And would the net number just be post any inflationary pressure on cost, or is there anything else in there we need to take into account, which means that number might be lower? Thanks a lot.
So, look, it's a bit early to say, as I said, we are still at an early stage of the program. That includes also myself being around just for a couple of weeks and diving into it. When you think about gross versus net, true point I want to make is you need to consider kind of, inflationary aspects that obviously go against this gross contribution of EUR 1.5 billion.
I think that's the main item to keep in mind. There might be, but this is, again, something that we are just working through, also some investment required. But again, this is something that we are still determining of, how much that is, and if it would be of any meaningful number, we would also talk about it. Otherwise, my, with the visibility that I've got right now, I can see that we've got already a lot in our CapEx plan embedded.
On October, I think, we are doing quite well on the seat load factor, surprisingly well, and at the same time, we were able to reduce our yield decrease, which also indicated in my opening remarks that we would see the stabilization over the last weeks and the two months. I think we are getting close to zero here, which of course, is a much nicer number than the single-digit decreases we have seen in the year before.
So expect October to be strong, especially once again at Eurowings and Discover. At least in Germany, which is quite relevant for us in this regard, there is this, I called it before, the never-ending summer kind of travel, that people towards the summer destinations in the Mediterranean continue to expand their vacations.
And even now, between the German fall holidays and the late summer holidays, people, obviously without schoolchildren, continuously fill our airplanes to these destinations. So I think we see a new behavior here, which is very much helping us on the leisure side, and we see that also this October of 2024 in a very positive way.
Understood. Thank you both.
The next question comes from Sathish Sivakumar from Citi. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks, everyone. Thanks for your time. I got two questions here. So firstly, around the disruption or slash year related to cost up to EUR 40 million, can you like just split it by, say, the airline passenger? So how much of it's actually from Lufthansa, and also, how much of it's actually driven by, say, the bottlenecks in Munich as well?
And the second one is around the productivity gap that you mentioned as part of the improving cost turnaround, 13% below 2019 levels. And if I had to say, understand the productivity gap, is it mainly driven by, say, issues related to disruption, and then how much of it's actually related to the grounding of aircraft because of GTF? So as and when those aircraft comes back, do you expect this productivity gap to normalize? Yeah, thank you.
Yeah, sorry, we had a little bit difficult time to have the acoustics going well enough to understand you completely. But if I get your questions right, let me try to answer and please get back if we have not correctly understood you.
Yeah, sure.
The EUR 240 million IROPS cost, Frankfurt versus Munich, we had a little bit more problems this summer in Munich than we had in Frankfurt. That is correct, but all German airports were affected also, but the non-German airports, like Zurich and to a certain degree, even Brussels and Vienna, be it strikes, but let's not forget weather.
This was a very difficult month of July for aviation this year, and also air traffic control, especially over France, was once again significant problem this summer, affecting, of course, all our competitors' hubs as well, and that's what caused this number to go up. So it's way beyond our internal problems, which we also have. Indeed, I didn't try to hide.
On the productivity and it still being 13% below, remember we were at 20% even in the first half of the year when the strikes came on top. This is driven by, of course, delayed aircraft, where people are trained on the wrong aircraft type and are not able to schedule as efficiently as we usually would do. It's also driven by the fact that our aircraft physically are on the ground.
More than 20 aircraft, getting back to your Pratt & Whitney questions, are currently being grounded because of Pratt & Whitney issues. So yes, a big part of this will melt away, and the rest of the productivity gap, we will try to close by renegotiating our labor agreements, which are currently limiting our productivity.
This is one of the big internal topics the management of the airline is addressing with co-determination in our partners in the unions. Some of these rules are as old as Lufthansa. It seems like more than 30, 40 years old, so I think there will be a significant increase of productivity also driven by those negotiations, where there is a joint interest, because also our unions understand that the growth of the core airline is currently inhibited by its efficiency challenges.
Maybe just to complement a couple of figures.
Yeah.
Sorry, Sathish, just to complement a couple of figures, in terms of the IROPS. So last year we had EUR 500 million for the full year. This year alone, in the first nine months, we had already EUR 550 million of IROPS cost, which obviously you can see is on a full year basis, is exceeding last year, quite a bit. And yes, this element forms part of the turnaround scope or the efficiency scope, because IROPS costs are something which obviously, when we improve stability, and we will also benefit. We're also going to see the requisite benefit, and this belongs to the program. That's true.
This, again, the irregular cost, is it mainly like at Lufthansa mainline, and that's where the bottleneck is, and the rest of the airlines are mostly negligible disruption costs. Is that fair?
I don't have the exact figures at my fingertips, but there is a very sizable and also disproportionately high share at Lufthansa Airlines. But of course, also, an element of that was strike driven, and that was not only Lufthansa Airlines, so you had it elsewhere also. So, yes, very sizable. Lufthansa Airlines, disproportionately high, probably, but you've got it in across the board.
Okay, got it. And then just maybe one quick follow-up on the productivity. So Carsten, you did mention that majority of it actually will be addressed as soon as you get the grounded aircraft back, and then the aircraft deliveries back on track. Just assuming that the grounded aircraft are coming back by end of next year, so would that imply by end of next year, you should have at least got into around 70% productivity gap being addressed?
First of all, the grounded aircraft, if you talk about the A320, this will go on way into 2026. So we're not, we're not going to have all of our aircraft back. And even think about the 787. There will be 15, I think, over the next year, sitting on the ground in South Carolina. Assuming certification occurs, we cannot take delivery of 15 aircraft overnight. We can probably take one aircraft per three weeks.
So definitely, 2025 will still be a year where we will have to work on decreasing the productivity gap. Is it close to 70% by the end of the year? It's probably not the wrong guess, but it's difficult for us to quantify at this point without the exact dates of aircraft deliveries known to us. But for sure, it will come down, leaving ATC and weather, of course, as a fixed factor aside.
You did mention about going back to the unions and negotiating on the other productivity. What does it mean in terms of the current pay deal that you have done? Because it is a multi-year pay deal. What does it imply that needs to be renegotiated as well?
Sathish, I'm happy to continue on the investor relations team later. I think we have to go to the, colleagues so that they also can ask questions. Okay?
Yeah, sure.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Stephen Furlong, from Davy. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Morning, gentlemen, and welcome, Till, and morning, Carsten and Marc. I see in your, your interim report, you do talk about, obviously, you've mentioned that you, the sustainable adjusted EBIT target of at least, 8%. That is a goal, and you strive to achieve that as soon as possible.
So I'm assuming it's very much determined or dependent on the turnaround program, and very clear, one, the growth effect of one point five by 2026 and two point eight by 2028. I'm assuming to some extent, there's some assumptions there about the modernization of the aircraft fleet, because obviously, that's a major issue here, which is affecting the numbers this year.
And at some stage, you're assuming that the negative jaws effect of negative unit revenue and ex-fuel cost rises is going to arrest itself or invert, basically. So just might talk about the 8% margin in general terms.
And then the second thing is maybe more for Carsten, but basically, do you think that when we look back, say, 2028 to 2029, that the Lufthansa Group, the kind of where it's the geographical dispersion of the business, do you think it's more kind of west facing than east, given that the unleveled playing field there is east? I mean, maybe you look at, obviously, with the investment in Alitalia, hopefully it gets approved and it gets closed, and maybe you look at TAP as well. So just a general comment on the margin and where the geographical, positioning of the company would be in the future. Thank you.
Stephen, good talking to you. On your first question, if you do the math, this year, I think it's worth to say we'll be getting to 8% already if you leave the Lufthansa core airline out. We all know that investors don't do that, analysts don't do that, and promise you, the top management doesn't do it that way. But for seeing what we have achieved over the last years, we were more or less hitting the 8%.
I'm sure we will be above the 8% at the Lufthansa Group, outside the Lufthansa airline. So in the Lufthansa airline, as Till pointed out, the turnaround program is essential to get to the 8%, but also not forget that there are some elements to get aircraft, which will obviously take care of themselves.
If the aircraft issue alone is EUR 500 million, you see that what Till has said is a very realistic target also for the Lufthansa airline. We're pretty sure we'll get to the 8%, of course, depending on market developments in terms of is it, how many years it will get, but we will get there, and the rest of the group is already there while we speak.
In 2028 and 2029, I'll be in the middle of my career at Lufthansa, so I will then probably have a Lufthansa Group, which is for sure facing more south. I think we should not underestimate the Southern Hemisphere in two ways of thinking. First of all, we see a lot of economic development in that part of the world, and last but not least, it will be a significant leverage to our seasonality issues.
Because obviously the Southern Hemisphere, when it comes to leisure for sure, is exactly countercyclical to our more Northern Hemisphere markets, which, of course, Lufthansa mainly depends on, so I think there will be two elements, additional growth in this market and a little bit better leverage to reduce our seasonality, and I think, let's be honest, the Asia development will very much also depend on geopolitical issues.
Will the Russian airspace be open by 2028 and 2029? I think we all hope so. If that's the case, I think we'll see the China business recovering faster because it's not the demand out of China which is stopping us, it's the uneven playing field, and if that's not the case, I think China will still be a challenge, but let's see how that goes. The North Atlantic, regardless who wins next weekend, will be also the commercial backbone, I think, for all of us network carriers, also in 2028 to 2029.
That's very, that's great, Carsten. Thank you, and I'm sure you'll be only halfway through your career by then.
I'll speak to my wife about that tonight. Thanks, Stephen. Thanks for your trust.
Ladies and gentlemen, in the interest of time for the remaining questioners, please limit yourself to one question only. And the next question comes from Harold Alexander from HSBC. Please go ahead.
Yes, hello. Thank you for taking my question. I understand that based on the recent BGH ruling, you still have to provide Condor with preferential conditions until other court decisions will be reached. You mentioned earlier this year that you already changed the conditions for Condor over summer. Does the BGH ruling mean that you are allowed to continue with the conditions this summer, or do you have to go back to the old historical contracts, and is there a risk that you have to pay back Condor some money this year from the higher prices that you charged this summer? Thanks.
Alexander, thanks for that question, because this allows me to qualify indeed, some misunderstanding. No, very important, first of all, there is no court decision on the topic itself. The German Supreme Court only forced us to continue until a final court ruling is occurring, which will be in Q1 2025, my lawyers tell me. Until then, we are obliged to continue the, from our point of view, improved SPA conditions, which were higher priced and lower availability, is what we changed after the German court in Düsseldorf ruled in May.
So there's no need to go back to the old crazy conditions we had before, and therefore, of course, your second question, there is no need to refund because we are allowed to continue with the current SPA. Long term, I don't know of any hub in the world where the hub airline is forced to feed its competitor. So I think this will end up like every other ruling in the world on these topics will end up, but it will take some time, and we take it through there.
And then next question comes from Ruairi Cullinane from RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Yes, good morning. Just one question on the notable EUR 75 million swing, as adjusted, EBIT, within other. If you sort of quantify some of the moving parts there, it seems like expenses and the improvement in SunExpress could continue into further quarters. So if you could expand there, that would be appreciated. Thanks.
Do you mind just repeating your question again? I was just struggling to completely catch what you said.
Sure. Please, could you expand on the EUR 75 million swing at adjusted EBIT in other, and to what extent we could expect that to continue into future quarters?
Yeah, I see. Thanks for that. So look, the other segment or kind of category, in essence, here we've got a positive contribution from the basically project expenses, which we are carrying at headquarters functions. So that is positive. There's also some FX in, which contributes in that line. And again, by nature, obviously, the first one that I mentioned is something that we control. To your question in the future, how would that behave? FX, obviously, is coming as it comes.
And then the next question comes from Muneeba Kayani, from Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Thanks for taking my question. I just wanted to follow up on your earlier comments on the corporate demand side. At this point, where are you in terms of corporate travel recovery compared to pre-pandemic levels? Have you seen a pickup in that demand recently, and how are you thinking about that into next year? Because we heard some kind of positive trends from the US airline. Thank you.
Yeah, hello, Muniba. I can confirm that trend, when it comes to the North Atlantic, where we indeed, we see a pickup. Overall, we have recovered just to 60% total, a little bit less in Germany, a little bit more on intercont, and 60% right on Cont in general, if you go beyond Germany. And, we see the pickup still existing, but let's be honest, it's at a slow pace.
But I think we have seen the worst, and therefore, I think also we have to understand when you look at the numbers, we always do this in passenger numbers. The U.S. carriers do it in revenue. If you want to compare that, you more or less have to add 10% to 15% to it, because that's what yields went up in corporate traffic over the last years. I hope that helps you a little bit.
Yes, thank you.
The next question comes from Johannes Braun from Stifel. Please go ahead.
Yes, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. I actually just have one technical question left. I'm trying to get my head around why the full year RASK guidance was slightly downgraded to a mid-single-digit decline. I think before it was low to mid-single. Just seems counterintuitive to me, given, the current trend is rather for an improvement in, in RASK and yields as you slow down capacity growth.
Yeah, let me, let me remind you. So we've given you that picture on a full year basis, because that's in the end, kind of what matters. Of course, we've got the fourth quarter ahead of us, and when you think of... It's basically between kind of yield and seat load factor and a bit of a RASK-specific comment that I'd like to make.
When you think about RASK and yield in the fourth quarter, just let me remind you, in prior year, fourth quarter, we had some effects which inflated the other income, which were about a still COVID-related release of provisions for unflown tickets, some OEM compensation payments and insurance payouts within the prior year Q4.
So this inflated income last year means actually that this year, in Q4, the RASK decline will be higher than the low yield decline and seat load factor increase would actually suggest. Okay? So it's a pure prior year comparison, not impacting this year's numbers.
So in other words, the yield development will be significantly better than the RASK development in Q4. Is that fair?
That's correct.
Correct. Okay. Thank you.
The next question comes from Antonio Duarte from Goodbody. Please go ahead.
Good morning, gentlemen. Thank you for taking my question. I just wanted to—my question relates to ITA and its possible integration in Lufthansa Group. So in this, how might this materialize in terms of initially, the impact on costs and later on, if it can provide, can you give us some color on it can, on the headwinds it can provide in terms of, of profits for the group? Thank you.
I think ITA integration will be a double-digit number of investment in IT systems and some resources to align, you know, certain things. That, I think, considering the size of the business, is probably negligible. If I don't get your question wrong, ITA, we don't know the ITA numbers currently, because due to the lack of, you know, rights from the EU Commission, we're not allowed to look into the books, but I've seen the press, and we all know that ITA is doing better than what we had put into our budget and business plan.
I think we will see probably an overall positive development compared to when we took the decision. When it comes to overall profitability and margin, probably ITA will be somewhere between our best and our worst airlines when we start.
Thank you very much. Perfect.
Ladies and gentlemen, this was the last question. I would now like to turn the conference back over to Marc- Dominic Nettesheim for any closing remarks.
Thanks to everybody for your interest, for your questions, and we are also looking forward to continue the dialogue on the investor relations side and also to meeting you together with our board members on the upcoming conference season and road shows. For today, thank you very much, and we're now closing this call. Bye.
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