Malta International Airport plc - October Traffic Results

On 4 November, Malta International Airport plc published the October 2014 traffic results, revealing a 2.9% increase in passenger movements when compared to October 2013, welcoming a total of 421,726 passengers. This was attributable to a 0.5% increase in the number of take-offs and landings as well as an increase in the overall seat load factor of 83.9% compared to 81.6% during the same month last year.

UK was still the top market for MIA, albeit passenger movements saw a marginal drop of 0.8% over the same period last year. Meanwhile, France registered the largest growth, at 25.8%, on the back of increased capacity on the Paris and the recently-introduced Nantes routes. Passenger movements from Italy and Germany increased by 8.9% and 2.8% respectively. Switzerland established itself as the fifth major market in October, with a 20.2% growth.

Markus Klaushofer, the CEO of MIA was encouraged by the growth that the Company continued to experience in the off-peak months, as Malta is slowly managing to establish itself as a year-round destination among visitors, especially those from continental Europe.

 January to October 2014

Since the beginning of the year, MIA saw an increase of 6.7% in passenger movement when compared to the same period in 2013, hosting a total of 3,807,534 passengers.

The Company recently revised upwards its passenger movement forecast for 2014 to +4.2% to an estimated throughput of 4.3 million passengers. The initial estimate for 2014 was for a growth rate of 2%.