There you go. Okay. Well, we are reporting the first half of the financial year, so this is April-September 2023. We delivered record profit over EUR 400 million. I think you have to put that in context of all sorts of external issues affecting the business, proving the resilience of the model. Cash increased to EUR 1.8 billion. We delivered 25% more passengers than the previous year, and when you relate it to pre-COVID passenger traffic, we are up about 50% in the reporting period. You recall, we talked a lot about operations and investments into operations, especially following the experience in summer 2022.
We made significant investments, and clearly, we achieved significant results coming from those investments. Recently, last two to three months, Wizz Air has become one of the best performing airlines in Europe in terms of completion rate and on-time performance. And you can see that in the first half, and it had some issues, especially in the June, July period. All in, we delivered 99.2% completion versus 98.1% completion in the previous year. But of course, capacity was up by 27%, 63% versus the same period in pre-COVID year. And that drove revenues by 39% and 83% versus fiscal 2023 and fiscal 2020, respectively.
RASK improved 10% in the period, mostly on tickets and somewhat on externalities. Costs reduced overall by 12%, helped by fuel price movements in the market and our hedges, and actual cost was down 1%. We will talk about this because I'm sure that you will have questions why only 1%, but you will have to see how the engine issues were sort of evolving throughout the summer and how they affected our operations and put some adverse impact on our cost performance. But of course, the big topic is GTF. We just entered into an operational support and financial settlement agreement with Pratt & Whitney.
That is significant because that creates predictability for the operations, but also it is creating predictability for financial impact and the offsetting of that financial impact. We have also taken a number of mitigating actions to make sure that we are protecting capacity going forward. We have extended a number of current aircraft leases, and we continue to take new aircraft deliveries. If you just look at those two lines, we're gonna get more than 30 aircraft delivered in 2024 by Airbus, and we will have roughly around 10 aircraft extended on leases. So that's kind of our way of mitigating the capacity impact of the groundings.
As we said, we are expecting to ground around 45 aircraft, as of January. We will certainly learn how exactly the program is gonna unfold in terms of induction times of engines and recovery times in the short, but this is a pretty good estimate, the best estimate of the day based on our current best knowledge. So moving to the next slide. So the usual statistics, you can see. I mean, we are certainly very pleased with our ability to grow the business 25% year-on-year and 50% versus pre-COVID times. I think clearly we can say that this came out of the COVID period with strategic gains.
We are one of the structural winners of the COVID times, having been able to invest against new market opportunities and solidify our positions in existing markets. That has enlarged the footprint of the business, creating a much larger skeleton to continue to grow the business for the long run. I would also note that our sustainability performance continued to improve. We cut back on our carbon emission footprint quite significantly versus the pre-COVID period, as well as last year. Just very recently, we were recognized by CAPA, the Aviation Research Institute, for our sustainability performance, being named for the second time to be the most sustainable airline globally.
Which of course, we are very pleased with, especially as that ranking is taken based on data based on comprehensive analysis. Moving to the next slide. Just back to the GTF matters. I'm sure that you have more questions than answers I can provide, but let me try to recap what it is. So you recall there was tranche one, and there is tranche two coming. Tranche one had a limited impact on Wizz Air, only essentially six engines were affected and we were able to cover most of the exposure with spare engines. Now, tranche two is different. This is what we are heading towards.
A service bulletin was issued by Pratt & Whitney, which imposes certain number of cycles for the engine inspections, and once you reach the cycle limit, you have to stop the engine in operation, you have to remove the engine. The engine has to be inducted and inspected in a shop and cleared before you can operate the engine again. We were modeling the impact of those. We are expecting around 45 aircraft to be grounded as a result. So 25% of our fleet will get grounded due to the coming issues. Obviously, it raises two questions. Fundamentally, one is operational: how do we operate the fleet? How do we operate the markets?
How do we stay competitive with that kind of a magnitude of capacity exposure? And two, how do we account for the financial impacts of those? With regard to the financial impacts, we have a bespoke commercial and financial settlement agreement with Pratt & Whitney. I'm sure you would ask what it is exactly and tell me the numbers, I can't. This is confidential, but you actually can figure it out quite easily if you read their assessment, the rating assessment, how much they think deal have to be provided to customers and the market. And with that is 10% of the operation of the GTF engine. You just run the financial numbers and you're gonna get to it.
But, it is significant, and indeed it is protecting the business from a financial standpoint. But the real challenge coming with the GTF exposure is not financial, because we have the protection there with the settlement agreement, it is operational. Because of course, we want to protect our markets, and we want to stay competitive as a, as a business, and we want to make sure that we fly the capacity required by demand. Now, we will have to learn how exactly this is gonna play out, but our, our best assumptions at this point in time is that 45 aircraft. We have an agreement on induction, program, so not every engine is gonna be, inducted immediately into shop, so there is a bit of a queuing.
Depending on the very scope of the inspection, it will determine the shop time, the shop visit time. If you just take the very issue, the engines are removed for inspection, that's roughly a 60-day issue, but once you remove an engine, you do other inspections on the engines, too. So, and that will depend, determine for how long you're gonna take the engine out of service and, keep it in the shop. So that varies engine by engine, basically. But we modeled all of that, and we're seeing that this is roughly an 18 month program, from start to, to finish. And over the course of the next 18 months, our engines would be hitting, shops.
This is, of course, subject to availability of shop capacity, subject to material supply to the shops, et cetera, but based on our current best knowledge, this is what we are estimating. And later, I will talk about the fleet, the fleet composition, that you understand how the fleet is growing, versus the lines of operations of the fleet, because the two things will go away from each other for some period. We also address the Abu Dhabi issue that arose back in 2022. You recall we had significant operational issues there. We replaced the bulk of the fleet in Abu Dhabi for V2500 powered aircraft.
You know, still a hot temperature, sandy environment affect the operation, not only the GTF, but it also affects the operation of the V2500, but it is just a more mature technology, so you can spread the pain over a longer period of time, and you can create more predictability over the operation of the engine. So this is largely behind us. So we're seeing that we have an operating platform that is predictable now, plannable, and we can manage it operationally as well as financially. So I guess one significant question comes out of the GTF testimonial is capacity overall what this business is going to deliver next year versus the current year.
Maybe the best way to put it, this year, we are carrying roughly around 65 million passengers. Next year, we are planning on carrying around 65 million passengers. So we're seeing that we can uphold capacity, with the mitigating actions and the programming of the GTF inspections. There will be little wobbling here or there, so maybe the front end is gonna be somewhat lower on capacity, but we're gonna be regaining that capacity, over time. As we are coming to the end of the program, capacity will be eased as we would be regaining engines. So overall, fiscal 2025 capacity is predicted, estimated to be the same as fiscal 2024 capacity.
But there might be variations by market, and there might be variations by months, as we would be building up towards that. And with that, let me turn it over to Ian.
Thank you, Joseph. Can you hear me? All right, so the fourth key themes that we keep on hearing that I want to address today are in terms of our ability to consistently deliver profitability, something that was tested over COVID, our ability to control costs, and to keep them in a downward trajectory, the yield outlook, and liquidity. So in terms of the financial performance, despite adding 27% more capacity through ASKs, we managed to grow revenue 39.1%, EUR 3 billion in revenue for the half. So there's a number of milestones here for the company. So record revenue, record capacity, record passenger size, and as a result, we delivered EUR 878 million worth of EBITDA.
If you look at our fuel costs, they're actually down year on year as a factor of both fuel price and, of course, our hedging policy. But our EBITDA was 4x as big as it was this time last year. So we're bringing that profitability back, and our EBITDA margin is 29%. So pretty respectable results for the half when it comes to EBITDA. And in terms of net profit, EUR 401 million, again, a record number, something we're pretty proud of. In terms of cash, EUR 1.84 billion as of September 30, and that's a 20% increase year on year. So we'll look at cash later on, but as part of the liquidity theme, but overall, a respectable performance.
So despite the challenges, we're growing pretty rapidly, and that's a feature of both better operational performance and a growing fleet size, until, of course, the Pratt issues hit us. So moving on to the next slide, please. In terms of revenue performance, that's the feature of, you know, our yield and our load factor. So the 27% capacity that I mentioned in the last slide, you know, that puts, that would normally put a lot of pressure on yield, but we're still bringing our revenue per available seat kilometer up 9.6%, so 4.91 versus 4.48 last year.
The increase comes in the form of ticket RASK, so 17.4% up, and the ancillary was close to EUR 1 per passenger year-on-year. So we're still delivering in line with our anticipated trajectory there. Load factor was up to 93%, so almost six percentage points higher than last year. And overall holding, as you can see from our traffic statistics, notwithstanding the capacity that we're adding to the system.
Our ancillary products continue to evolve and reflect where we see demand, and what we do there in terms of pursuing the use of artificial intelligence and machine learning continues to be something that we spend a lot of focus on and will focus on, especially as we enter into a period of potentially slowed growth as we work our way through the engine issues. Next slide, please. Unit costs. So as you know, we've set a number of KPIs in terms of where we want to be operationally. And utilization is, of course, a very important part.
Our utilization for the half is 13 hours and 22 minutes, significantly better than last year, 11 hours and 49 minutes. However, it is lower utilization than we had expected, and that was driven by the issues such as engines. So we had non-powder metal-related issues plaguing us throughout the summer, as well as the general disruptive issues that the industry faced all summer. And that drove higher disruption costs. Disruption costs driven by cancellation, by delays, disruption costs then imposed on us by EC261 costs. And as a result, that was on staff, disruption, and a few other areas.
Certainly, distribution costs change as the mix of our airline evolves, and when I say mix, our geographic mix, and overall, our crew costs are also impacted by that as we move from different cost bases. Certain tax consequences associated with that. So our ex-fuel CASK for the half was lower, just under 1%. The second quarter, it was driven higher again, by the challenges we faced through the summer for engines and overall disruptions.
Now, you know, we're pretty excited about having this landmark deal with Pratt that, I think we're the first one to announce, and that will address the costs associated with the engine issues for the foreseeable future. Then, when it comes to the overall cost pressures that the business faces, we have been able to show completion factor, on-time performance dramatically improved by the investments that we made in our business over the last 12 months. So the August onward numbers, August, September, October, November, we're seeing significantly better completion factors, better performance. As a result, we'll actually eliminate the opportunity to pay compensation costs by actually delivering the product.
That will deal with the disruption costs. That's why we're confident going forward that our ex-fuel costs or CASK will continue to reduce. Next slide, please. In terms of cash and liquidity, you can see we're actually generating more cash this year than last year, which makes sense considering we're a bigger business. I think the important point to note is that we were able to receive confirmation from Fitch that our investment grade rating holds, so no change there. We have conversations with Moody's anticipated later this month to begin that journey towards their credit committee.
And in terms of our net debt, it's flat year-on-year, but our leverage ratio has come down dramatically from 27x last year to 5x. And that is expected to continue to reduce and delever the business as profitability continues, and we satisfy our debt obligations. So liquidity was healthy, and leverage is reducing. In addition, we're in a position now of a positive equity on the balance sheet versus where we were before, so that helps overall on the balance sheet. Next slide, please. In terms of free cash flow, you can see over the pre-COVID to post-COVID, we're starting to generate a lot more cash through EBITDA cash conversion.
Working capital is an area that we're spending a lot of focus, especially since we go into this season. And we're, you know, very focused on in terms of being disciplined due to the obligations we have. But that being said, we have tools in place to get through the low points. So obviously, the cash element or the cost element of the impacted engines from Pratt are now dealt with through our compensation agreement. We have our PDP facility in place to address any shortfalls in terms of our comfortable cash minimum levels. And then we have the ability through the winter now with taking capacity out of the system.
So no longer having to deal with 27% growth, but maybe flat growth, is to be able to generate cash from terminating or suspending cash negative routes and yielding up on our fares. And so overall, the outlook for the winter looks stronger than it has because we've managed to address the costs through operations and through compensation. We've managed to enter into an environment where we can price up due to scarcity, and overall, the demand looks well. So that's where we are on the financial side of things. I believe that's my last slide, and I'll hand the floor back to Joseph, and I'll look forward to your questions. Thank you.
Thank you, Ian. Well, we were, we were talking about all these external challenges affecting the, the business, and I, I would just want to recap those and kind of the ways how we are mitigating and addressing, them. We have talked a lot about the GTF issues, and I'm pretty sure that we will have ongoing discussions around that as the, the program evolves, and we're gonna learn how exactly, it's gonna unfold. But we, we have taken a number of initiatives, so we are trying to be as proactive as you can be, with regard to the issue. So I think we are very probably the very first, operator coming up with a settlement agreement and announcing a settlement agreement with, with, with Pratt & Whitney.
We definitely wanted to create predictability and visibility around the issues on the one hand, and two, you can imagine being one of the largest operators that, you know, you get treated by the OEM accordingly. We have also recosted the network as such that we maximize the benefits of the new operations, whatever is left of that, after the groundings and we put the new aircraft on longer sectors to optimize the performance of the entire fleet. And as said, we have taken a number of initiatives to protect capacity through the extension of existing leases. I think the second group of external factors is geopolitics.
If you just look back over the last 20, 21 months, so we started with the war in Ukraine last February, then we went through some events between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and we operate both countries, and here we go now in Israel, where actually Wizz Air is the largest international carrier. So we have a significant capacity deployed to the market. I think we have kind of learned by now how to best deal with events like that. I mean, simply when the market becomes closed or unsafe, we withdraw capacity, and we reallocate that capacity, and we do that with a very high degree of efficiency, very quickly.
I mean, there is a short-term impact, of course, because you need to create some sales lead time , so probably six to eight weeks, you will have capacity on the ground. But once the capacity is reallocated, you will start building up the franchise again, and you will start earning revenue on that capacity. I wouldn't say that this is, like, totally routine to the business, but fairly routinized when things like this happen. I think we know how to deal with them. Fuel cost, well, you know, these dynamics better than me, how that in the marketplace. We have resumed our hedging program. I think that hedging program is now totally effective, similarly to the times before suspending it.
So we are back in the game with that regard. And let's not forget that as we continue to make new aircraft deliveries, we benefit from the fuel efficiency of that technology of the aircraft. And I will have a slide. I will show you that actually this is a significant benefit derived from the new fleet renewal program. And macro uncertainties, I seem to keep talking about that is the world in recession or not, and how demand is affected. I've done a few interviews this morning. I mean, if I just wanna summarize it, people say that, "Okay, fine, we understand summer. How about winter?" But the same questions have been posed year after year.
So there is, I think, quite a degree of uncertainty in the minds of people looking at demand on a lot shorter-term basis than longer term. We have a well-diversified network, and believe me, that the view of life is very different depending on where you are in the planet. So there is skepticism in Europe, especially in Western Europe. Central Eastern Europe is doing better than Western Europe with that regard. But you go to a country like Saudi Arabia or the United Arab Emirates, I mean, those countries are sparkling. I mean, they are taking benefit of the times. Trade is up, incomes are up, people are spending. And I think the more diversified you are, the better hedged you are against these macro uncertainties.
But all in all, we are seeing demand robust. We are not seeing any significant changes. We're seeing that, people want to fly, they have the, the money to spend, and demand remains intact overall. And then you have all these, industry challenges. I mean, we made one significant investment. We made a lot of investments, but one very significant investment that we decentralized our operating model. So going from, like, a one-airline approach, towards a multiple-airline approach by having four AOCs. Those four AOCs have been solidified and are very robust. They have matured a lot. And clearly, if there is an issue in one place, we are able to isolate ourselves from that issue in other places.
We have invested a lot of management capacity and leadership capabilities against that model, and we are clearly benefiting from that. Also, we added more support to the operations in the form of more spare aircraft and more spare crew to make sure that the recovery process is aided, capacity-wise, as well. Just simply not relying solely on the improvement of the supply chain, but if it doesn't improve, that we are still not dependent on the matters, but we can affect them directly our own base. You will see in the operational results have been largely improving as a result. Moving to the next slide.
I just want to address a few points quickly that you have better perspective. So let's start with operational performance. This is showing the two major KPIs: On-Time Performance and completion rates. Now, we don't have the industry numbers on this chart, but the industry has been coming down on performance structurally, and this is the function of the underperformance of the supply chain. So you take On-Time Performance, the industry performed a lot better overall in 2019 than how it performs at the moment. At that time, ATC was intact, airports were intact, handlers were intact, maintenance providers were intact. They all deteriorated to some extent. So I think you have to take that context.
But really what we are trying to demonstrate here is, first of all, there is a significant rate of improvement year on year. You can see the kind of the light blue line. This is last year's performance. The red line is current year, and the dark blue is pre-COVID performance. So you can see that we are in between last year and pre-COVID. So we are trending up a lot better than last year, but not at the level of pre-COVID times. But again, the industry is not at the level of pre-COVID times. If you look at completion rate, we made a huge investment into completion rate. We prioritized completion. We're seeing that the customers have to fly. They paid for the tickets.
They have to fly, and we need to make them fly. So you can see that we are starting to really come back to pre-COVID performance levels above internal target of 99.5%. And I can tell you that if I take August and September, actually, Wizz Air was the best-performing airline in Europe. No other airline achieved higher completion rate than than Wizz Air, and we were consistently beating our low-cost peers, the other low-cost carriers. So really what I'm saying here is that we made significant investments into operational resilience, into operational KPIs, and you can see significant improvements coming through. Next slide. So this is about utilization. I mean, utilization is cornerstone to the business model.
We are still not where we need to be, relative to pre-COVID times. Some of it is provisioning for the supply chain inefficiencies. So the business had to carry more slacks, more spares, as a result of the problems, given our strategy of self-help. And also the Pratt & Whitney engine issues started to come in in our operations already early summer. So we started grounding aircraft, and as a result, those groundings were eating up spare capacity, so we had to create more spares, and it kind of started creating a ripple effect.
Now, we improved our utilization actually quite a bit versus fiscal 2023, but you see there is still a gap to fiscal 2020, and this remains our benchmark where we want to go back to. The next slide. So load factors continue to rise. This is all in context of very high growth, so we are up more than 50% versus pre-COVID capacity, 27% versus last year's capacity. So all these load factor numbers need to be seen in a very high-growth setting, and obviously that puts some pressure on load factor performance on short term. I mean, over time, we will recover that, but short term, it creates some pressure, but it is improving, and it's coming back to standards. Next slide.
Ian noted fuel efficiency, and I also took note of the fact that it is not just hedging, but we are operating a better fleet of aircraft for fuel burn, and you can see that the technology essentially offsets the impact of ETS and emission cost in the system. So primarily, we are relying on technology. Hedging is good for eliminating short-term volatility, but the real game is technology. And when you compare our fuel burn performance to our peers, this is where we are winning very clearly. We are outperforming the entire industry on fuel performance and fuel burn. Next slide.
So talking about the brand, it's almost like two categories of markets: the established incumbent markets, the home run in Central and Eastern Europe, and kind of the new markets in, in Western Europe and the Middle East. You can see that we are very consistently performing in Central and Eastern Europe, very high awareness levels. Obviously, after 15, 20 years of operation, you should be expecting that. But very importantly, we have been gaining a lot of grounds in Western Europe and in the Middle East, so our awareness continues to rise very, very steeply. So next slide. Market shares, very important that in the reporting period relative to previous year, we continue to build market shares.
So now we are up to 24% of the total of these markets versus 22% a year ago. Fairly consistently, our market share positions have been enhanced in most of the markets. Moving to the next slide. This is important. I'm trying to explain it to you because there are two lines now we need to track. We used to be showing this to you, and you were able to model it kind of easily that okay, we will grow in the fleet, we are going to fly more capacity, and then you derive your numbers from that. Fleet growth will continue to unfold, so nothing is really changing with regard to long-term fleet growth. It's as intact as it used to be.
Actually, short-term fleet growth is enhanced through the extension of existing leases. But the lines of flying will not match up with the fleet growth because of the groundings. So you're going to have a bit of a depth here. So, starting in the back end of 2024, fiscal 2024, throughout fiscal 2025, you will have a reduced number of lines of flying as a result of the Pratt & Whitney issue. But why this is important is that, you know, we might be flying, say, you know, 40, 50 less aircraft in fiscal 2025, but once those aircraft are cured and cleared, and the engines are back in line, the following fiscal year, we are going back to 287 aircraft.
So this is going to be a significant growth year because gradually we are gaining engines back, and also we benefit from the supply of new aircraft deliveries. When you look at the GTF engine, this is a short-term issue, not a long-term issue. It doesn't affect the trajectory of growth for the business. And last but not least, sustainability. As said, we are happy to be recognized as globally the best performing airline, sustainability-wise. We have, as said, made significant investments into SAF. We are coming up with commercial contracts with producers, but also we are making equity investments there. We're seeing SAF is probably going to be the bridge between now and 2050, when we would be expecting a brand-new propulsion technology coming to the market in the form of hydrogen-powered aircraft.
But this is not a short-term matter. This is more of a long-term matter, and we look at how best we can affect the SAF program. Changing gears, we appointed a new director to the board, Ms. Phit Lian Chong from Singapore. I think she brings in another perspective, a more Asian perspective, and you see that we are expanding in Asia. And we are trying to enhance our corporate standing with that regard. So moving on, I guess this is something of interest to you, although not a lot of change. With regard to capacity, we are reconfirming our previous guidance.
You recall, we issued an RNS in September, and at that time, we affected the capacity guidance with the unfolding Pratt & Whitney issues, and we are reiterating that guidance. So we are expecting the second half of fiscal 2024 to be up 20% year-on-year, in the construct of 25% in Q2 through Q3 and 15% in Q4. With regard to our load factor performance, we are expecting to fall in line with recent trends above 90%. Actual cost to remain on the same trend, but we are reporting for the first half, so lower than a year before. We narrowed the range on net profit. We had EUR 350 million-EUR 450 million.
We are putting it into 350-400. I mean, obviously, we had to take all the issues into account, the war in Palestine, the process of the Pratt & Whitney matters, and we're seeing that this is a better reflection of our current best knowledge of the situation and the corresponding performance of the business. And that concludes my presentation. Thank you. So please go ahead with your questions.
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How has the aircraft on the ground evolved from March? So it go up from there, because it started going down straight away. Is there a pause, and when should we expect that to go to zero? Second, also on the GTFs, we've seen one of your US peers who operates GTF say the planes they haven't yet got are also going to have problems with the engines. Is that the same for you, or when you get your deliveries, are the engines fine? And then third, how do you expect this to impact your unit revenue economics into next year as the RASK impact, the CASK impact, think about your network having fewer planes to operate? Thank you.
Yeah. Thanks, Alex. Good questions. I expected to have more questions than answers on the, on the GTF. So look, I mean, it's. I said it is, it is about an 18 months program. So maybe the best way to think about this, is that around number terms, we have 200 engines affected, which will have to go through inspections at one stage. Not all falling in January, because depending on when the engine reaches a cycle limit, it will have to be removed and will have to be inducted into shops. But total exposure, 200 engines. Okay? I think we're probably going to be, inducting something between 24-30 engines a quarter. So if you run the numbers, probably this is like a six quarter program. So that's why I'm saying that this is an 18 months, program.
And depending on the very scope of the engine inspection, it can be anything between two months to, I don't know, six months. But against that, you have protective capacity, like extension of leases, and an increased pool of spare engines. So this is not all net negative, because there are some offsetting mechanisms. So we are getting a lot more spare engines from Pratt & Whitney as a result of that. So the exposure is going to be reduced, and obviously, capacity is protected through the lease extensions as well. So this is a long program, so this is not going to be resolved very quickly. So we have to plan smartly around it, and we are doing it.
And that, that's why it was very important to enter into this agreement with Pratt, not only for the financial settlement, but also it has a lot of operational support elements in terms of induction slots, you know, in terms of managing capacity and all those sort of matter, spare engines, et cetera. Well, with regard to the new aircraft deliveries, the engine deliveries will not be totally clean in the short term, but they will become clean at one point. And this is something that we are trying to clarify as we speak. But sometime during 2024, Pratt will or Airbus will deliver clean engines to the market.
But in between now and that point, there will be still engines that will remain subject to inspection once they reach the cycle limits. Unit costs, of course, that's not helping, because we are going to operate less efficient aircraft in part, and we will be grounding our most efficient aircraft due to the engine expansion. So I think this is going to put some short-term pressure on cost performance. But again, you have to look at it from at least a medium-term perspective, because so like through the 18-month cycle, we're going to be out of this, and economic efficiency will be reinstated.
Actually, even at a better level, because by that time, you will have a lot more old aircraft out of the system, a lot more new aircraft delivered to the system. Sorry?
There's no RASK as well.
Oh, yeah. I mean, RASK, this is supply and demand. If you contain supply, obviously that helps your pricing performance, assuming standard demand or unchanging demand, intact demand on that. And we are not seeing anything that would suggest that demand is changing or falling. So yes, as we are containing ourselves, we should be benefiting from that through pricing, through RASK.
Hi, it's Andrew Lobbenberg from Barclays. I'm really respectful of your need to be careful on what you communicate on the settlement, but I know everyone and I, we're all very curious. Joe, when you were giving your prepared remarks, can you just repeat what you said is the best place we might go to try and do our homework to model it? Did you say to look at the RTX and your share of the fleet, or, or, or was it to look at something from the, the, the credit upgrade? Can you, can you give us that? On timing, what can you say on timing? When will this compensation be booked to your P&L? When will it be booked to your cash flow?
Okay, with regard-
How would it be accounted? I know you're gonna be constrained on what you can say, but I've got to ask.
Yeah. So please appreciate that we are bound to a confidentiality agreement, so I cannot tell you what the deal is, okay? But just trying to be helpful, I think RTX has made a number of communications to the market, projecting the financial support they need to put in and invest into their customers. We are 10% of those engines in operation, so I think you can figure out a number. And I think it will be probably fairly close to the realities. I cannot say anything more than that. But with regard to the operation of the compensation of the settlement, I mean, this is as is, where is.
So basically, as the cost incurred and the compensation kicks in, it's gonna be immediately settled month by month. So this is imminent. So this is not like, you know, put into long-term credits or anything like that. It is imminent cash, immediately paid, immediately booked.
Yeah. Good morning, Ruairi Cullinane, RBC. Perhaps on a slightly different track, ancillary RASK up quite modestly. Please, could you talk around that? What's performing well, what isn't? Would you be able to give us any unit revenue guidance?
Okay.
-into Q3? And then there was some compensation relating to prior periods, within other costs. How much exposure is left there? Perhaps the claims, particularly last summer.
I missed the last, the last question. Sorry, say that one again?
It looked like there was some compensation relating to claims in prior periods within other costs. Is there much exposure there left?
Yeah. Okay. So in terms of ancillary RASK, I touched upon that when I was doing the slide. So we're seeing obviously strength in the ticket RASK, but on the ancillary RASK, you wouldn't expect to see much of a similar growth rate. But we are still on track with our EUR 1 per year progression on that side of things. So there's no issues there. I think we see different opportunities throughout the year to price more versus less, so no concerns there, and we still continue to be very excited about our ancillary business. In terms of unit revenue for Q3, we are waiting and evaluating the impact of all of these things that we've been digesting over the last basically six to eight weeks.
So making sure that we understood the impact of the service bulletin that came out on Friday, getting the deal across the line and making sure that we are able to book it where we want to book it and treat it the way we want to treat it. We also have other things that we have to factor in, like the Tel Aviv situation and the Palestine situation, and making sure that as a result of our new business, which is a world that we haven't seen in a while, right?
We've been growing very fast for quite a period of time, and now we're having to look at things from a perspective that I don't think many of us have ever seen, having to take that kind of capacity out, other than maybe COVID, but of course, you didn't have a demand environment in that perspective. So we want to make sure that we look at our overall revenue guidance and revenue picture in the context of all these moving pieces, rather than simply coming out with a number that we then have to correct. So we're taking a cautionary approach on revenue at this point, but as Joe said earlier, the demand environment is still robust. We're not seeing a decline in demand. We're just not yet prepared to quantify that.
In terms of the compensation attributable to prior periods, yeah, there's still-
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Morning, it's Jamie Rowbotham from Deutsche Bank. Three from me, please. Just if you talked about protecting the capacity in the face of these unprecedented GTF challenges, you've clarified that overall, capacity is potentially gonna be flat year-on-year next year. I'm just trying to get my head around to what extent what you fly in fiscal 2025 might look different to 2024. As you said, you know, aircraft being out of sync with the flying lines. Any more color you can give us, I know it's difficult, on that would be helpful. Secondly, was just to come back to Alex's point about contaminated engines potentially being delivered to you in the early part of 2024.
Given the time it takes to get engines inducted, given that they have to complete certain numbers of cycles before they have to come off wing, isn't there a risk of a significant number of engines being grounded in calendar 2025, affecting fiscal 2026? And the last one, coming back to the near term, did you receive some compensation from Pratt in Q2? I noticed the net other income was higher than normal, and the notes mentioned supplier credits. And if so, is that where we should expect to see it reported going forward? Thanks.
Okay. Maybe starting with the last point. Yes, we have received compensation, and we'll continue to receive compensation as we move forward. I said, I mean, the compensation scheme post-agreement is basically imminent, as is very. So as an issue happens, we're gonna get compensated for that. So back to protecting capacity. Indeed, the 2025 or fiscal 2025 network is not gonna be exactly the same as the fiscal 2024 network, despite the flat capacity, what we are expecting because we have been investing in certain markets and we are protecting those investments, and we will have to kind of de-scale certain other markets in order to be able to achieve that with flat capacity. But the way we try to do that is not to go overboard either side.
So, we have taken a few principal decisions that we want to maintain the footprint and the skeleton of the business, so we don't wanna start closing bases, countries, whatever they are. But that is gonna be capacity alterations. And when we are talking about flat capacity, please don't take it like it's gonna be flat every month throughout the whole year. So you will be seeing some variations of capacity, especially the early part of next year is gonna be somewhat down on capacity, but kind of the later part will be up because we're gonna be regaining some of the engines. But it will be different, not dramatically different, because the footprint is gonna be maintained, but somewhat different.
But we try to contain the exposure either side. With regard to contaminated engines still to be delivered new, I mean, as I think we will have to learn. This is something which we don't fully understand at this point in time. I think what we know right now is that the engines delivered new are not yet clean, but we don't know when the cut over is gonna be. So we have to learn that. So we don't know how many engines we are talking about, but there is another program in the backdrop, which I think is significant, that Pratt stepped up to enhance their spare engine deliveries to the operator.
So, we might be able to offset all of that or most of that, I don't know. So I think we just have to learn what the issue is and how to best mitigate that issue. But, Mike, I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, but we are expecting 2024 to be the turning point at one time to see the engines coming clean.
Yeah, I think, you know, roughly mid-year, they're still working through on when that will happen. I think, you know, kind of related to your, will we see a subsequent hit? I mean, remember right now, the grounding is driven by everything kind of quickly now based on cycle counts, but you have to look at when the engines start coming back, they won't come back in one giant chunk. They'll be coming back incrementally. So any subsequent inspections will be more naturally graded as you move through the cycle, so we shouldn't see a big hit again in the, in the following period.
Thank you. Good morning, it's Jarrod Castle from UBS. Yeah, two or three. Just thinking about MENA, you know, largest exposure of low-cost airlines. You spoke about, you know, parts of the region which are doing very well financially, but, you know, clearly as a region, the risk profile has gone up. So, do you think differently about the opportunity and also differently about kind of the eastern expansion opportunity, just given the what seems to be higher risk? I mean, I know you're kind of cautious, you know, and the question's been asked before, but can you give a bit of an indication what is actually being booked for 3Q? You know, Lufthansa said 80%, IAG 75%, you know, very high levels for Ryanair.
At the very least, is RASK looking positive at the moment? And then just lastly, you know, are others going to eat your lunch, frankly? I mean, no growth in 2024, 2025. You're coming back in 2026 with massive growth. By then, others could be on the route. You might be entering new routes. You know, what is that gonna do to your pricing outlook, even though capacity looks restrained? Thanks.
Yeah, just to clarify the last point, I don't think we are saying that no growth in 2024 and 2025 and huge growth in 2026, but well, first of all, I was talking about fiscal 2025, fiscal 2026. So fiscal 2025 ends March 2025, and fiscal 2026, March 2026. And already, I think maybe the best way to think about this, if you wanna kind of really pin this down, that I think in the first half of fiscal 2025, so this is next summer, we're gonna be somewhat below previous years', capacity. But in the second half, yeah, we will be already up against previous years' capacity, and gradually, we're gonna be regaining that, that kind of a trajectory, what we originally put forward.
In fiscal 2026, so summer of 2025, winter of 2025-26, I don't think we're gonna be seeing a lot of the GTF issues still. This would be beyond that, because, again, it is not just the recovery of the engines, but it is also the spare engine line, which is hugely enhanced, hugely enhanced. I mean, we will have, you know, dozens and dozens of spare engines coming to create another protective layer for capacity. So with regard to the Middle East. I mean, I really don't wanna get into politics, but yeah, I mean, you may argue that that part of the world may be less settled from a geopolitical perspective.
But having said that, I think the situation is actually fairly well contained yet. And if I look at demand, I mean, we are not seeing change in demand in Saudi or the UAE. I mean, the demand, of course, affects Israel in a big way and to some extent, the neighboring countries like Jordan, Egypt, but not really further. So we are not seeing a profound impact on demand in Abu Dhabi, for example. I think the risk profiles of the markets are different. I mean, the Middle East certainly is a vast creation, high-growth market, which will stimulate air travel, for the future. And with that regard, I think it's a good spot to be at, from our standpoint.
Maybe the geopolitical profile is more intense in that part of the world. And then you look at Europe, I mean, I think the European problem is that Europe is going increasingly bureaucratic, increasingly burdensome, low growth, overall. So that will, I think, tame demand a lot more. So it's a predictable jurisdiction, maybe less prone to geopolitics, although we don't know. So I think it's just a different profile of markets, but one of the things that we have been learning over the years is that diversification is a good strategy.
You know, we are clearly seeing that, for example, demand remains very strong in Central and Eastern Europe, and that's a home run for this, even under challenging macroeconomic circumstances. And I think it's good to have your eggs in different baskets. With regard to bookings, I mean, Robert, you may wanna comment on that, but we are not really seeing any profound changes in the booking profile.
No, I think no changes in the booking profile. We're seeing healthy demand coming through, as Ian mentioned earlier, for Q3, so, nothing abnormal there.
Yeah, I think I would add just on that. So if, you know, if that's what we're seeing for 27-25% capacity guidance for Q3, if you look at the rest of the competition, they're seeing, you know, healthy yields for Q3 with maybe single-digit capacity growth. So that then further emphasizes or underpins our expectation as to what will happen in Q4 and onwards when we take capacity out of the system. We'll be able to increase our revenue that way.
Oh, it's James Hollins from BNP Paribas. A few clarifications, really. Obviously, you're limiting capacity full year fiscal 2025. Am I right in thinking you're implying that's mainly reduced frequencies rather than anything regionally or closing bases? And where regionally might those frequencies be coming down or relative to the growth you might have put in, I suppose, is the question. Secondly, József, I think you talked about inspections taking two to six months. My belief was some of the wing-to-wing inspection is more like 300 days being talked about by Pratt & Whitney. I was wondering if you could sort of clarify your thoughts. I may just be being stupid.
And then the final one, maybe talk about what you're seeing on wet lease and engine lease rates, what trends you're seeing there, and whether it matters if that's just part of the compensation, if they've gone through the roof? Thank you.
Okay. Maybe just to clarify the inspection. The current profile of engine shop visits is that you remove the engine, it takes three months to induct, and it takes six months to go through the shop. It's a nine month process. That's the current profile. What I was saying is that I excluded induction from this equation because induction is now agreed with the Pratt. We have a process how to, how to induct. But if you look at the very scope of the issue, what they are inspecting with the recourse, it's two months, it's 60 days. But I'm saying that, you know, when you remove an engine, you are not going to do a 60-day inspection of one issue. You're gonna be incorporating a number of other issues.
So that's why it can be extended to six months, what we are observing at this point in time. So, and we shall see. We shall see what issues to deal with. So that's how to read the two to six months. Now, with regard to the lease market, of course, it's through the roof. I mean, that's an opportunistic market anyway by its nature. So when there is demand, of course, there is a lot of demand for used aircraft, for V2500 powered aircraft. But we are not really subjecting ourselves to that. But first of all, we are getting supply of engines ourselves directly.
And in that regard, I think, you know, Pratt is making the right call to support operators as opposed to supporting a speculative market. And when it comes to wet lease, actually, we have not even been contemplating wet lease. We are pursuing this extension on our own aircraft, and most of actually those lease extensions are pre-contracted. So there is a formula that if you extend what the terms of the extension are in terms of economic terms and operational terms, et cetera. So we are not really subject to this kind of rapidly changing market environment on the leasing side. But of course, we are of course keeping an eye on what's happening there. I mean, it's through the roof.
Just comment one more on that point.
So yes, I think relative to where lease rates were on older aircraft now versus then, they've increased. But relative to what we've been paying, because we took those aircraft in as new aircraft, it's cheaper. So you see a cost savings for us by doing so. And on top of that, we otherwise would have had to redeliver those aircraft, which means putting them through a whole bunch of maintenance activities, where we see supply chain challenges and high rates currently, obviously, inflationary pressures. By deferring that, pushing down the road, we benefit from not having to incur those costs right now, especially because some of the maintenance requirements are only required because of contractual reasons and not because of technical reasons. That's a benefit that you'll see by exercising these extension options.
So with regard to managing capacity for fiscal 2025, yes, it's gonna be largely on frequencies as opposed to bases or board markets.
Good morning. It's Harry Gowers from JPMorgan. I've got two questions. First one, sorry to ask, and I vote on Pratt. Can you just clarify, you just going to be compensated for the fixed cost of any aircraft which is grounded for a period of time, or is there anything else we need to think about included in the compensation package? And maybe just going back to, to James' point, obviously, there's a direct cost here, but will you get compensated for some of maybe the indirect costs that come with it? So for example, if there's a cost which comes with extending leases on your existing aircraft as well.
The second one, are you able to quantify maybe any of the cost benefit that you could get from Pratt over the second half of this year, which is gonna help towards the EUR 50 million-EUR 400 million of net income guidance?
You are playing salami on us, and you try to pin us down from another direction. I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I'm not gonna be able to reveal anything that is commercially sensitive. We have a robust financial settlement program, but I cannot go into details to what extent this is direct or indirect. And with regard to the second half, I mean it is significant. And as said, the problem with this is that we are not going to be able to guide you exactly on the number, because the number will depend on the number of events, number of days actually we are affected by the inoperation of the engine. We're gonna keep reconciling these matters as they occur on a month-by-month basis, issue an invoice to Pratt, and they will pay us, pay us for that.
Conor Dwyer from Morgan Stanley. I think this question probably will feed a bit into the Pratt issue as well, but just in terms of the guidance, there was a guiding out for EUR 350 million-EUR 400 million for the full year, H1 is EUR 400, so you know, close to breakeven in H2. Consensus was before this morning, I think, had you materially worse than that breakeven level. I think it was closer to about EUR 200, and this quarter we've missed the consensus run rate. So I'm just wondering how you square that in terms of the building blocks there. Is pricing holding up much better than everyone's anticipating? 'Cause unit costs, frankly, seem to be tracking a little bit worse than expectations. Is there a big fuel tailwind that you're expecting?
Obviously, that's been weakening a bit, or indeed, revaluations from the dollar? That'll be helpful. And then in terms of the FY 2025 going into next year, and I accept obviously you'll be getting quite a bit of compensation, but surely going from the current run rate of growth, you'll have done quite a bit of staffing. My expectation would be there's gonna be quite a bit of upward pressure there on unit costs. How do you expect that to kind of track into next year? And the year after, we've got this huge jump again in capacity as all those planes come. And I suppose the worry there is you're kind of increasing the breadth of the network all of a sudden again. Does that not put significant downward pressure on unit revenue then?
So my thinking on that is, when do we get to a level, in your view, that we're at a kind of normal level of profitability for this business? FY 2027, probably a fair anticipation of that. And actually, how do you think the margin of this business looks like versus pre-COVID? I mean, it was high 20s EBITDA margin pre-COVID. Do you think that's still achievable by then? Thanks.
So let me deal with the second question. Ian is going to address the first one. So I think you're right that fiscal 2025 is gonna be a CASK challenge, a unit cost challenge, and fiscal 2026 is gonna be a RASK challenge. The cost challenge will come on the suboptimal fleet composition, the suboptimal lines of flying, resulting from the Pratt & Whitney issues. And fiscal 2026 is gonna be posing a challenge on very high growth, but it will be on a total different setting, on unit cost. So I think unit cost in 26 should be certainly helping us offset the pressure on CASK to a large extent, if not a full extent.
I mean, just imagine that fiscal 2026 fleet, which is basically largely fully converted into A321s and into A321neos. So you're gonna be flying the best technology available in the market with the highest gauge of aircraft relative to the industry. I mean, this is immense by design unit cost advantage versus anyone else. And that's gonna be the contest against the maybe the cost, the RASK pressure. But with regard to the RASK pressure, I would just note that please look at it like. So if you take the market footprint of Wizz today, it is constituted of two distinctly different elements: the incumbent markets, Central and Eastern Europe, basically, and kind of new markets.
Some of it is in Western Europe, some of it is in India, in the Middle East. I mean, we maintain that footprint as we speak, so it's not like that we are trying to channel that growth through one market or a few markets, but we're gonna be spreading that growth. In a way, you know, what we are seeing already is that actually markets are lined up for growth. I mean, you know, we could deliver more growth to today. In terms of how that translates into margin performance, I mean, to be honest, I'm not expecting a huge deterioration of margin performance, if any, versus the current financial year.
I mean, the current financial year is not gonna be back at optimal margins due to all the issues what we are facing. But I think in fiscal 2026, you should start seeing consolidated margin performance coming out of the business. And even if I take the next financial year, due to the settlement agreement with Pratt & Whitney, I don't think you should be expecting margins to be under huge pressure.
Okay, so in terms of the building blocks, for the guidance, so first of all, you know, we're not in the business of speculating on fuel price or FX price, right? So that's if there's a benefit there, that's great, but that's not something that's, you know, we're building our guidance off of. With resisting the temptation to get into the details of the Pratt deal, we have to assume that the compensation is there to cover the cost of grounding. That's why we have a deal, and that's what everybody's been consistent in terms of talking. So if you are able to neutralize the grounding cost, then what you have basically is an airline that is more or less, between now and next year, the same size airline, albeit without the pressure of growth.
So we now have the ability to take capacity out or have, not, not have the ability, we're forced to take capacity out, that there's no cost to doing that because of the compensation from Pratt, which means that we're able to focus on those routes that are both cash and profit negative, initially. So you take those out of the system. You start with EUR 401 million for H1. You have to say, you know, to get to EUR 350, you have EUR 51 million to play with at that point. You don't have no cost of the grounding of the aircraft, and you have the ability to take out unprofitable routes, especially at a period of time where you would normally experience that because of the seasonality.
On top of that, you have the revenue upside that you're able to deploy to those lines of flying that are flying. So that's how we get to ultimately the confidence to maintain that guidance. Oh, and just one other point on the hedging, right? So the hedging is based upon our hedging program was built based upon our anticipated volumes pre-Pratt. As a result of now taking capacity out of the system, our hedge protection increases. So should fuel price increase during this period, we are actually better protected. We have more of a And you can see in the numbers now 70% for the next six months on fuel. So we actually have more protection than we otherwise would have had to offset that fuel pricing.
All right. I guess that completes the Q&A on the ground. Any questions from the systems?
Yes, we've got a question from James Goodall from Redburn Atlantic. In fact, two questions which you may have covered to an extent: Do you expect to grow earnings in full year 2025 on flat capacity and with the compensation? And his second question: When all the capacity comes back online, once the GTF issues unwind, the full year 2026 year-on-year growth rate will be enormous. How will you deploy this capacity growth profitably?
We are not guiding on earnings, so I would not like to get into this at this point in time, given the variability of issues on hand. I think we need to work ourselves through it. But to be honest, as far as I'm concerned, I mean, I don't think you should be expecting dramatic changes on earnings. With regard to 2026, I think we covered this. Yes, it's gonna be significant growth, but at the same time, it's gonna be against a significantly reduced cost base, because by that time, we would be fully benefiting from the renewal of the fleet and the gauge of the fleet towards A321s, which will be a huge offsetting mechanism against the kind of the yield pressure arising from growth.
Great, thank you. And three questions from Sathish Sivakumar: Can you clarify, apart from the airport charges, where do you see the volume-based incentives? And what's the conversation with airports regarding no capacity growth into full year 2025? Is there any compensation that you have to pay? Second question: If you've cut capacity into full year 2025, how will it impact your network, UK versus CEE versus Middle East? And finally, can you clarify if you're seeing issues with engines that are being delivered?
Look, I mean, thanks for the questions, but I'm not sure I can go that granular on answering those. So, but with regard to airports, well, please assume that we have some degree of flexibility. It's not like months on months or year on year. I mean, we have a long-term commitment to airports, and our long-term commitment is not affected with this issue. We have to operationally work ourselves through this, but if you put that in a long-term perspective, this is not going to affect our positions with the airport. So, no significant from the current issues.
But I mean, I don't wanna go into details on market by market, so we have never guided on that regard. We are going to be adjusting capacity against a flat overall capacity guidance for the next financial year, with some variations market by market, but we are trying to minimize those variations to create kind of a band which is fairly narrow. So in a way, we are trying to protect every one of the markets we are operating from. So you should not be expecting, again, dramatic changes with that regard.
And then on the last question, with regards to whether we're seeing issues on new engines, the short answer is no. So we expect, until we hear otherwise, that these engines will have to go through an inspection cycle when they hit their threat thresholds. But in the meantime, you know, we've learned a lot about how to operate these engines and how to protect them from the challenges that have grounded other airlines' fleets prior to the Powder Metal issue. So we've been moving aircraft around our system to avoid the environment that causes more stress on them. And we're operating them in a way that tries to reduce the number of cycle counts.
So flying them on longer stage lengths and, and operating them in under different thrust levels to make sure that we, we maximize what we can out of these engines to allow for shop capacity to come online, for turnaround time, visibility to become more clear, and for as many engines that are affected of ours to get through the system first, so it doesn't create a backlog later on for one of the questions that mentioned 2026 impact. So that's the answer, Satish.
Thank you very much. And a final question from Stephen Furlong from Davy: I get GTF is a short-term issue and will unwind. Do you expect it to still be an issue into summer 2025, i.e., full year 2026?
I kind of hope that we understand the GTF exposure as we speak. I mean, just look at the history of the supply chain, kind of recently started with the grounding of the MAX aircraft, and now we are grounding GTF. I mean, we don't know what we don't know. But at least the good news of all of this is that I think this is kind of pinning down the OEM, this is pinning down RTX and Pratt to really get focused on everything when it comes to engineering, design, manufacturing, parts, materials, et cetera. So you know, every crisis is an opportunity for getting refocused and make significant improvements. I think Pratt Raytheon are taking this very seriously.
They are designating significant efforts and significant human capacity to address the issue. So, I would hope that this is the end of it, and from here on, we're gonna be hearing good news from them. They are clearly making the efforts, and they are clearly making the investments.
Thank you, and that's the end of remote questions.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much. Thank you for coming. Thank you for your attention and your questions. Yeah, we are in interesting times, but take some assurance from the fact that, over the last really, almost two years now, we have been disproportionately affected relative to our peers, by many external factors. We are standing, we are delivering record numbers in terms of passengers, traffic, capacity, profitability, et cetera. Yes, we have to process all those issues, but you can see that the organization is a lot more resilient than ever before. So again, back to the previous point, you know, we try to take every crisis as an opportunity to, to get better, and come out stronger. Thank you.
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