Versus 2023, and 0.2% versus 2019. So we have 50,000 passengers more than 2019, and that's a new record. I think the good news is as well that it's not only passenger numbers, where we saw a record, but cargo as well. So we had nearly 289,000 tons of cargo, which is 21% more than last year and 5% over 2019. The record so far was 2010 with 294,000 tons of cargo. We saw records as well in our subsidiaries. Malta reported 9 million passengers last year, + 15%, and Košice 0.7 million passengers, + 18%. So I think in our small airport group, we saw records and excellent results throughout. So what's the outlook now for 2025? We expect approximately 32 million passengers in Vienna and approximately 42 million in the group.
You might think that this is the usual cautious approach Vienna Airport is taking. I think we have good reasons to be cautious in 2025. The approximately 32 million cover everything from 31.5-32.5, maybe 33. But the main reason for being cautious is the strong summer we saw in 2024. We had an absolute record throughout all the summer months, both in terms of absolute volumes and in seat load factor. I think given the difficult economic outlook and situation our economy is facing here in Austria, there's good reason to be cautious. The second part obviously is the geopolitical situation. I mean, this morning we learned that there might be a major improvement in the situation in Israel and Gaza. This might be an upside.
This would be, I think, very welcome news for our home carrier, Austrian Airlines. They really miss the passenger flows from Tel Aviv via Vienna to the U.S. So yes, obviously if the Middle East situation there is a bit relaxed, this might be an upside. But overall we are cautiously optimistic for 2025, and we would foresee a small growth compared with the record numbers of 2024. Coming to the details, I think what is worth noting is that we saw strong growth in local passengers and smaller growth in terms of transfer passengers. Compared to 2019, we saw a decrease in transfer passengers. I think this is good news for mainly Austrian Airlines. Local passengers have on average a higher yield than transfer passengers.
So I think this is a good development as well. What's good as well is that we saw a reduction in terms of flight movements compared to 2019. And so this gives us a kind of capacity reserve compared to 2023. We had an increase of 5.9% in terms of flight movements compared to 2019. It's - 12%. In total that we had 234,000 flight movements. Seat load factor was on an all-time high, 80.8%, compared to 80.5% last year and 77.3% in 2019. I think what's important to note as well, the seats per flight increased from 157 to 170, 171 in 2024. And I think this underlines the structural change of our traffic. As I said, Malta 9 million + 15% vis-à-vis 2023, + 22% versus 2019, Košice + 18% versus 2023, and + 32% versus 2019. Overall, a very strong development throughout the group.
72 airlines served 195 destinations in 65 countries. 86% of our travelers were flying within Europe. But we saw a good development in our long-haul markets as well. 18% growth to the Far East, where there's still some room to grow in the future, mainly due to Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Tokyo, and 10% growth to North America. I think this is a positive development. The only market where we saw a decline, vis-à-vis 2023, was the Middle East, - 13%, mainly due to passenger reductions in Tel Aviv, Amman, and Jeddah. Looking at our airline portfolio, Lufthansa Group has a market share of close to 51%, Austrian 46%, the low-cost carriers 30.5%, Ryanair 20.9%, Wizz Air 6.4%. So I think this is quite static, essentially the relation between Lufthansa Group and the low-cost carriers.
I think this is a development which is absolutely okay for us. Austrian growing quite significantly, 5%, Ryanair 11.6%, and only Wizz saw a slight decline, mainly due to the engine issues you are anyway aware of. One of the markets where we still significantly behind 2019 is Germany, - 1.4 million passengers. Switzerland, - 440,000 passengers. France, - 130,000. Netherlands, - 220,000 passengers. We saw in all these markets growth versus 2023, with the exception of the Netherlands. Still, a major reduction versus 2019. I think this is on the one hand due to changed behavior, less business traffic. It will not come back soon and not all of it. But on the other hand, it shows as well that there's quite some growth potential for the future.
I think it has something to do as well with ticket prices. I think it has to do with the general approach towards aviation in the German market. So I think there's some potential in the coming years to regain some of these passengers. If we look at the top growing markets in 2024 versus 2023, Italy, Spain, U.K., and the main declines we saw, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia. So I think this reflects what I said before. The major driver of this year's result was obviously the summer months. So from June to October, we really had throughout record figures. And this shows that we became more dependent on leisure traffic, which is still doing very well. We had also a record result in terms of cargo.
I think the main driver here is on the one hand our geographical location and the high quality service we offer. Not to forget, obviously the e-commerce boom, mainly from China. We really saw very strong growth in this respect. [audio distortion] Freight rate was growing 43% versus 2023. Overall, we saw really major growth throughout the sector. We have now 38 cargo-only flights per week and the market share for the VIE handling of 80%. Pharmaceuticals were growing as well, + 15% versus 2023. We doubled our result for our pharmaceutical distribution center compared to 2019. I think this is a positive development as well. What is very important is that we extended our contract with Lufthansa Cargo for another four years. East Asia is obviously the main driver of our cargo results.
Therefore, we intensified cooperations with Incheon Airport and with Korean Air. We are optimistic that we will see some positive results through these cooperations as well. One thing which was a major strength of Vienna Airport since the pandemic is our flight operation. We are still by far the most punctual airport and most punctual hub in the Lufthansa Group. In from January.
[Foreign language]
I think.
Yes, we heard that.
Perfect. Thank you. So we were the fourth most punctual hub from January till November. In November we were the third most punctual hub in Europe. So overall I think a very positive result. And Skytrax ranked us the 13th best airport worldwide. I think what is important as well is our security checks. 95% of our passengers are waiting less than five minutes at the checkpoint. So I think this is a very positive result as well. And our winter service, which we are operating ourselves as well, is working excellent. So it's obviously our ambitions to keep these high quality standards and especially for a hub carrier, but for the low-cost carriers as well. I think this is an important base for our economic success as well. A few words regarding the airlines.
Looking back to last year, I think it was very important that ANA resumed their flights from Tokyo. Hainan came back from Shenzhen and started Chengdu in December. Air Arabia started to Sharjah in December. SKY Express started to Athens in December. So overall, I think very positive development. Yesterday Scoot announced that they will connect Vienna with Singapore three times a week starting from June this year. Condor will open a base this year and operate flights to Frankfurt. So I think the first signs in the new year are positive, and especially I think East Asia, there is some potential to get probably the one or other destination back or new in the course of 2025. We spoke briefly about Malta. Yeah, nine million passengers is an absolute record.
I left in 2011 and I think we had back then 3.5 million passengers. The top markets, they are Italy, U.K., Germany, and Poland. You will understand that we need to heavily invest there in the coming years in the terminal, but in the airport city of Malta International Airport as well. In 2025, Malta Airport will invest EUR 70 million and overall in the next five years, they will roughly invest EUR 340 million . Košice, yeah, positive development as well, mainly due to the summer charter and overall again, a positive contribution to the group results. I spoke about our guidance. We expect approximately 32 million, as I said, could be anything from a flat development to 32.5 million passengers, maybe a few hundred thousand more. But I don't expect a major growth in 2025. We saw very significant growth in 2023 and 2024.
So I think we can do with a relatively flat development in 2025 as well. On the long run, I'm still very optimistic for the growth potential of Vienna Airport and the whole group. I think East Asia still has a lot of room for growth. Long haul in general, we'll see significant growth in the coming years. I think the XLR development is a potential for a market like Vienna. And as we spoke before, Germany, Switzerland, France, we are still far behind the 2019 figures. I'm not saying that we will reach the 2019 figures soon, but for sure we will make up to a certain extent. And then obviously the geopolitical situation could or should change to the better.
And, probably we see already positive development in the Middle East in 2025, which would definitely contribute to passenger growth in Vienna as well. On the other hand, obviously everybody's still hoping for peace, real peace in Ukraine after the war, which Russia brought over Ukraine in 2022. All these, I mean, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus were all very strong markets for Vienna. I think midterm I see some growth potential from these markets, as well. Therefore midterm we are still very optimistic for 2025. We are a bit cautious. Before I hand over to Günther, just two or three sentences to the political situation. As you probably know, there are now discussions between the Freedom Party and the People's Party to form a government.
I think, or I think they will form a government, and it shouldn't take more than a couple of weeks until this government is ready. I think looking at the aviation industry, we expect obviously a more aviation friendly environment with a government like that. I think this government would probably more appreciate that the Green Party how important aviation is for the economy in general, but for tourism in particular. We hope that we see a government which doesn't penalize aviation, appreciates the benefits of aviation, but on the other hand helps as well to invest more into R&D, to invest more into the production of stuff, because in the end this is the only way how aviation can become CO2 neutral in the next 30 years.
So overall we expect here some positive policy effects on the aviation from our new government. Yeah, that's it from my end. And I would like to hand over to Günther.
Julian, good afternoon . Following the traffic results of 2024, I can give you an economic outlook for 2025. Overall, we still see that consumers are reluctant to spend money. So the saving quota has gone up sharply. Private spending is more or less on the level of 2023. The only area where this is not the case is traveling. Although the overall economic framework looks rather gloomy for 2025 and we cannot expect substantial growth, we think that still traveling is a very high priority. Therefore we are optimistic that we can maintain the levels of 2024 also in 2025. Although we are not expecting substantial growth. Upside potential could be the end of the war of Russia against Ukraine and also further reduction of tensions in the Middle East.
And hopefully, the expectations with the incoming new president in the United States and his promise to end the war and to find solutions also to the very difficult situation in the Middle East could provide a positive surprise further down in 2025. Overall, our financial guidance for 2025 is sales around EUR 1 billion, EUR 80 million, EBITDA of at least around EUR 440 million, net profit around EUR 230 million, which is more or less in line with what we expect also for full year 2024. In any case, we are prepared for future growth and we are investing to cope with that growth potential. So our investments are increasing to around EUR 300 million in 2025. Roughly EUR 80 million out of that will be invested in Malta.
You have heard that Malta is fast growing and they urgently need new terminal capacity and all what is connected with it. They are also opting for a new Skypark. We will see substantial investments also in Malta. From our side, we can finance all these investments from our own funds. For the time being and maybe the next three, four years, we will not be in a position to look for external financing. Nevertheless, we'll be able to offer our shareholders a dividend in more or less the range what we saw for 2024 . A payout ratio of 60%-66%. I mean, we will take this decision once we have full years results. I think it's not premature to expect that dividend for 2024 will grow as results improve.
In regard to SAFs and Sustainable Aviation Fuels, we see that there is little production and prices are high. And to counteract that, I think it is very urgent to change EU regulation that SAFs can be used from any production worldwide. And prices per liter would go down substantially, because the production from biogenic means leads to around EUR 4 per liter, which is much too expensive. And there will not be sufficient SAF if we try to use only SAFs that are produced in Europe out of European by using European CO2.
So here we see substantial needs and necessity to improve regulation, also to create a level playing field, which is not the case in the current regulation. But overall, I'm relatively optimistic because, given that the government is formed as it is now discussed, the new government will be much more supportive and positive towards aviation, as the previous was with participating representatives of the Green Party, and from that side, I am relatively optimistic that we will get additional support. If we move on, you see again our guidance in detail. On the next slide, the financial highlights, just to remind you for the first three quarters. In roughly eight weeks from now, we will have the full year's results for 2024. From today's perspective, there will not be any surprise in that.
If we look at our airport city development, we see substantial growth also there. So, TUI will move to the airport and will start operations here. And also many other companies are on the way to the airport. Therefore, we will also increase our office park and the hotel that is planned to open in November is on the way. So building construction is going as planned. The same is true for our South extension project, and it will be ready in time and in budget in the beginning of 2027. A very important initiative from our side is to improve our digital abilities. And the innovation hub we created is working very successfully. On one hand, our partnership with Plug and Play. On the other hand, the initiatives that are on the way, for example, autonomous wheelchairs, cleaning robots, and especially full digitalization of planning, construction, and operation.
We are a market leader there, and it is a very, very powerful tool to improve planning, construction, and operation and to save substantially costs by providing higher quality. Especially our space cluster is developing very well. Enpulsion is going to increase the production here, and three new companies in the space technology are already booked. They will start operation in the coming weeks in our airport city. That's from my side, and feel free to ask your questions.
First hand is raised. It's Carlos. Please open the floor for this afternoon.
Hi, hello everyone, and thank you for taking my questions. Just two on my side. First, and with regards to the 2025 summer schedule, I see that some airports are seeing between 3%-4% increase in seat capacity. So I was wondering if you could shed some light on your expectations. And secondly, on Chinese traffic, could you share with us the number of passengers in 2024 compared to 2019 levels? Thank you.
We don't have yet the final flight plans for summer. I would not foresee a significant capacity growth in 2024 and in summer 2025. I think it depends if you compare with other airports. It depends a lot as well how these airports did in recent years. I think we saw a very strong recovery in 2023 and 2024. Therefore, I think it's not unnatural that we have a bit more flat development in 2025. I would not see as things stand today a significant growth in the summer schedules of our major airlines, Austrian, Ryanair and Wizz Air. If so, yeah, that would be a positive surprise, but I don't see it yet. Regarding China, I have to check to be honest.
I mean, China overall, you're not talking about big numbers. We have a daily flight to Beijing now. We have five times a week a flight to Shanghai and now with Shenzhen and Chengdu another five flights in total. So there's still some room for growth, but I don't have the exact figure at hand right now. And this is something we'll. I'll give you either later on in the call or Mr. Maurer will get back to you.
Follow up.
Okay. Thank you.
Please follow up.
Yes. Hi, and good afternoon.
Hold on.
Mr. Jäger, Mr. Ofner, thank you for your presentation. One question from my side, or actually two or three in total, but the first one is on the guidance. You guide for EUR 300 million in CapEx, which of EUR 120 million in the South expansion, and you mentioned some EUR 70 million in Malta. So, the rest is EUR 110 million. What is exactly behind that figure? Is it largely maintenance CapEx? Is there anything else I'm missing? Maybe you can shed some light on that.
Yeah, there is a logistics building included in that, the renewal of our cargo screening, and a lot of smaller projects throughout the whole company.
Okay. And is that something that is specifically higher for 2025 and would, might go down in terms of maintenance CapEx for 2026 and 2027? Or is it a new, a new normal that we should anticipate in terms of maintenance CapEx plans?
I would assume that we will see a level around this figure maybe for the next four years. Once the South extension is operational, we will continue with another building to enlarge Terminal 3 and to build new stands there. We will have a period of maybe five, six years where we provide the necessary capacity increases to meet future growth. As I said before, from today's perspective, at least for the coming three to four years, we will be able to finance all these investments from our own funds. From today's perspective, we are also willing to maintain our dividend policy.
Yes. Okay. Thanks. Understood. And maybe follow up on the Malta CapEx in specific. You mentioned an amount and a period. I did not get the number. Could you please repeat? So you plan which amount over which years in the Malta CapEx plan?
Malta has a plan to invest this year roughly EUR 70 million in the five years starting with 2025, EUR 340 million.
Okay. Thank you. And then one question also, for you, Mr. Jäger, on the passenger outlook for 2025. I'm fully aware what you said and I got it perfectly. But on the midterm, you turn more positive on the midterm. What is it based on? Is it based on a further that the demand will remain stable despite economic development? Is it also coming in effect that the seat load factor will increase gradually? So the frequencies and the movements might not need to increase that much. What is it? What is the sort of the mix for the years 2026 down to 2030 or something like that?
I think the major driver of growth will be demand, and I think globally we will see huge growth. I mean, markets like India, Saudi Arabia, East Asia, we will see very strong growth, and there will be spillover effects to Europe and Vienna as well. This is one area why we are on the midterm quite optimistic. Secondly, as I mentioned, we have some markets which are either dead, which were important markets for us, like Ukraine, like Belarus, like Russia. We have markets which have been very strong in 2022, 2023, like the Middle East, which, due to geopolitical reasons, we are much weaker in 2024. We have, on the other hand, markets like Germany, Switzerland, France, Netherlands, where we see quite some growth potential for the future if there's a, in general, more positive attitude towards aviation.
If taxes in Germany maybe are reduced on aviation in the future. So I think it's mainly the demand side where I see some potential for us in the future. And obviously, I think from our geographic location, it's very advantageous. I think Vienna remains a very strong tourism magnet. And still, as Günther said before as well, I think the people below 40 or below 30 will probably travel more than we ever did. Therefore I think in terms of values and importance to people, I think traveling and discovering the world has a higher value probably than 20 or 30 years ago. Overall, we remain optimistic and probably we will see in 2025 a relatively modest growth. That's our expectation from today's perspective.
All right. Thank you very much. And then maybe one more question, I think for both of you, regarding sustainable aviation fuel. First, did I understand correctly that sustainable aviation fuel, if it's used in Europe, needs to be produced domestically in Europe, so it cannot be imported? And secondly, you mentioned that it's roughly EUR 4 per liter, the biogenic one. And assuming that the oil refined Jet A-1 is, I don't know, EUR 2 per liter, so that would double the price the more you mix towards the sustainable aviation fuel. Is that a correct assumption, more or less?
Yeah, it's four times.
Four times. So it's one liter approximately now for Jet A-1.
It's even, I think some around 1,120.
Okay. Got it.
Is the oil-based price. Yes, unfortunately, I mean, the regulation stipulates that the CO2, which is part of SAF, has to be part of the European emissions trading.
Okay.
So, the only initiative I know of to produce outside is one initiative in Morocco. And the CO2 should be transported from Spain to Morocco to produce SAFs there. So that's, I would say, close to crazy to expect that with such a regulation we can get the necessary amount at reasonable price. So therefore, I think this regulation has to be changed if it's really probable that we will see progress there.
Okay.
If we don't change these regulations, I think this will bring about a lot of troubles starting from the [audio distortion] .
Okay. Got it. I mean, yeah, if you look at SAF, how it's produced, you kind of use from food waste, but that obviously is a limited resource. So you need the rest to be done from electricity. But if you use electricity, the utilization or the efficiency not as high, then it's far more expensive probably than the, so the EUR 4 will actually go up probably.
No, it would not go up in the areas where you get electricity at maybe EUR 0.005. I mean, in the desert of North Africa.
Yeah. Sure. But if you produce it domestically, then?
If you produce it domestically, it's so expensive that it will not be marketable.
Okay. Very interesting.
That's very clear.
Thanks. Very interesting.
Thank you.
Thank you. That's it.
I have the China figures now. In 2019, we had 344,000 passengers to and from China, and in 2024, there were 244,000.
Thank you.
Perfect. And I ask Vladimira to continue.
Yes. Hello. Thank you for an interesting presentation and thank you for quite an encouraging set of data. With respect to the overachievement of your original indicated numbers for the passenger traffic, would it be fair to assume that the passenger-related revenues and, in general, results there will be also higher? So that would imply that your guidance for 2024 would be too conservative, and we can fairly assume that you will achieve higher than previously guided figures. And then my next question would be regarding the third runway. Is there any progress in that topic? Do you see any change also with respect to the changing political landscape or how the project in general looks like? And then, I know that you don't navigate us regarding the cargo, but I would be interested. What are your thoughts about cargo developments for 2025? Thank you.
Let's start with the last topic. The cargo issue is difficult because one of the main drivers in 2024 was e-commerce. So obviously there's quite a political element in there as well. We don't know yet if the regime of the European Union would probably tighten a bit. I mean, if you look at Budapest cargo figures, they had a growth of 70% in 2024. And this is mainly related to the fact that all the shipments go through customs in Budapest and then they are distributed again in Europe. So there might be a downside effect from tighter regulation. Obviously the economy is facing difficulties as well. So we would be happy with modest growth. This is what we budgeted as well.
So very modest growth in cargo as well. Your second question, the third runway, no major changes. We don't expect changes due to the new government. In the end, this is not a decision taken by government anymore. Vienna Airport [audio distortion] has to decide, and we still aim to take a decision in, I would say, the first quarter or first half of 2026. Under the current regime, we have to decide until the end of 2026. Maybe, Günther, do you want to comment on the guidance?
The date of 2024, the question is open. Yes.
Vladimira, if you may repeat the question on results expectations for 2024.
Yeah. As I said, you overachieved your targets regarding passenger traffic, so should we assume that proportionately we should also expect better than guided figures for 2024?
Not proportionally, but in principle, yes.
What I meant proportionately is like passenger revenues, you know, I know that not all of your revenues are passenger-related, but all the passenger-related revenues would be higher than originally expected, right?
Partly, yes.
Yes.
Yeah.
Yeah. Okay. Thank you.
So at the moment, no hand is raised. Are there any further questions? Any follow-up questions? It's not the case. Then I thanks everyone. Yes, Henry, one follow-up.
Yeah.
Please go ahead.
Yeah. Just a small one, regarding your guidance. What kind of tax rate do you plan with for 2025? Is it the 24% statutory tax rate from Austria?
It should be 1% less because our corporate tax is going down to 23%. In Malta, it still remains at, I think, 33%.
35%. Yeah.
Or 35%. It's higher in Malta than in Austria.
Okay.
In Austria, it goes down by one percentage point.
Okay. Thank you.
Okay. Looks like we come to an end. If there is any further question, please raise the hand or start asking the questions. Otherwise, I thank everyone for participating in the conference call by showing the interest in Vienna Airport. First time on a Friday afternoon slot. Note, on 3rd of March. It's a Monday. It's not Friday afternoon. It's a Monday afternoon slot. Then, at the latest, we hear and see each other then on the 3rd of March. Have a good time till then, and all the best.
Have a nice.
Thank you.
Have a nice weekend. Bye-bye.
Bye-bye.
Oh, thank you.