Airline Profit Margins Soar Despite Revenue Challenges
Oliver Wyman on Transportation & Logistics
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Birgit Andersen, CONTRIBUTOR
By Tom Stalnaker, Partner
Thanks to cost reductions led by the decline of energy prices, industry consolidation, and capacity discipline, the U.S. airline industry is enjoying operating margins above 15 percent.
That’s a strong margin for any industry, but a particularly big deal for airlines, which have struggled in years past to turn a profit at all.
Even more impressive, according to Oliver Wyman’s 2015-2016 Airline Economic Analysis, margins remained strong despite recent revenue challenges. Yields have begun to decline after peaking in 2014, that is, airlines are bringing in less money on each revenue passenger mile flown.
Passenger aircraft operated by Air France-KLM Group, right, and a KLM jet taxi as a KLM plane takes off from Schiphol Airport, operated by the Schiphol Group, in Amsterdam, Netherlands, on Tuesday, Jan. 19, 2016. Air France-KLM Group, ranked as Europe’s biggest airline since its formation in 2004, is teetering toward an exit from the industry’s top tier after a year in which efforts to slash costs foundered on union opposition. Photographer: Jasper Juinen/Bloomberg
Unsurprisingly, the recent yield declines appear to coincide with creeping capacity growth for U.S. carriers system wide, but particularly in the domestic market. Historically, the industry has seen a high correlation between industry demand and nominal economic growth, so airlines have focused on constraining capacity at or below the growth of gross domestic product.
However, in the last 12 months, capacity growth in ASMs (available seat miles) has exceeded GDP growth both system-wide and domestically. The International Monetary Fund estimates North American GDP growth for 2015 at 2.9 percent. In 2015, U.S. domestic capacity increased 6.2 percent for value carriers and 2.1 percent for network carriers, with overall ASM growth for the domestic market at 3.3 percent.
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PlaneStats.com chart
PlaneStats.com chart showing airline revenue vs economic growth.
The increased capacity, combined with significant fare competition in the U.S. domestic market, has resulted in softening yields.
System-wide passenger yield declined 5.1 percent during second quarter 2015, compared with the same period a year earlier. The drop continues a trend emerging after a five-year period of yield growth, from mid-2009 to mid-2014. Revenue also peaked in mid-2014 before turning down. Network carrier system-wide revenue per available seat mile declined 5.6 percent during second quarter 2015. Value carriers dropped 4.9 percent during the same period.