KUALA LUMPUR (May 28): AirAsia X Bhd (AAX) fell as much as 1.5 sen or 5.66% to 25 sen after the airline's net loss widened.

As at 10.34am, AAX's share pared loss and settled at 26 sen, with some 8 million shares changing hands.

The long-haul low-cost airline reported its sixth consecutive quarterly loss since 4QFY13 on higher foreign exchange (forex) loss on borrowings which more than tripled to RM89.2 million in the first quarter ended March 31, 2015 (1QFY15) due to the weakening ringgit.

Despite this, Public Investment Bank Bhd (PIVB) maintained its "Neutral" call on AAX with target price of 35 sen.

The research house said that excluding one-off items such as forex gain/loss and gain on disposal, its 1QFY15 core net loss was RM33.3 million (1QFY14 core net loss of RM60.3 million).

Bad as it sounds, it said, the loss was expected due to softer market sentiment during the quarter following the unfortunate QZ8501 incident.

Passenger load factor fell to 74.1% in 1QFY15 (1QFY14: 86.0%), though revenue per available seat kilometer (RASK) improved by 6.9% year-on-year to 12.9 sen, it added.

"Despite the seemingly huge upside to our target price, we are retaining our Neutral call, however, with unchanged target price of RM0.35, pending more concrete indications of a turnaround in its prospects," PIVB said.