Thursday 28 Mar 2024
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KUALA LUMPUR (Dec 12): The number of passengers passing through the 39 airports that Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd (MAHB) manages in the country rose by 4.8% year-on-year (y-o-y) in November 2017.

A total of 7.9 million people travelled through the airports in Malaysia in November 2017, up from 7.54 million a year ago.

In a statement, MAHB said the single digit growth of passenger traffic movements for airports in Malaysia for November 2017 was in line with its expectations.

International traffic rose 13.2% y-o-y to 4.09 million passengers, while domestic traffic fell 3% y-o-y to 3.81 million passengers.

"The growth in international passenger traffic was mainly contributed by the Middle East, South Asia, North East Asia and Southeast Asia sectors. The AirAsia Group, Malindo Air, Xiamen Airlines, Hong Kong Dragon Airlines, Saudi Arabian Airlines and Emirates are among airlines that added large numbers to November traffic," the airport operator said.

On domestic passenger growth in November 2017, MAHB said it was essentially contributed by AirAsia.

"A number of airports including Langkawi, Kota Baru, Melaka, Subang, Labuan and Kuantan, experienced a decline in traffic over November 2016, contributed by reduction in airlines’ domestic seat capacity, especially by Malaysia Airlines and Malindo Air," it added. 

The Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) in Sepang handled 4.82 million passengers in November 2017, a growth of 7.8% from 4.47 million passengers recorded a year ago. Out of this, passenger traffic at KLIA Main Terminal rose 1.4% y-o-y to 2.26 million, while that at klia2 increased 14.2% y-o-y to 2.56 million. 

Overall aircraft movements went up 0.9% y-o-y in November 2017, with international movements registering an increase of 12.6%, which was offset by a 5.9% decline in domestic movements.

Systemwide, inclusive of its Istanbul operations in Turkey, MAHB handled 6.2% more passengers to 10.44 million in November 2017, compared with 9.83 million in November 2016.

Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen International Airport's (SGIA) passenger traffic grew 10.9% y-o-y in November 2017, as it saw international and domestic traffic increase by 15.6% y-o-y and 9% y-o-y respectively.

MAHB said overall average load factor was 74.1% in November 2017, a one percentage point less than in November 2016.

For the first 11 months of this year (11M17), passenger traffic at the 39 airports in Malaysia improved 9.3% to 87.51 million, from 80.09 million a year ago, while SGIA handled 4.8% more passengers at 28.74 million in 11M17, from 27.43 million in 11M16.

Systemwide, MAHB handled 116.25 million passengers in 11M17, up 8.1% from 107.52 million passengers in 11M16. 

MAHB shares closed up three sen or 0.36% at RM8.27 today, giving it a market capitalisation of RM13.71 billion. The counter has risen by 38.1% from RM5.99 on Dec 30 last year.

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