KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 18): Global airline share prices rose 29% over the course of 2017, with sizeable gains for European and Asia Pacific airlines, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA).

In its Airlines Financial Monitor for Nov – Dec 2017 released yesterday, IATA said airline shares outperformed the global equity market by 7 percentage points.

IATA said the industry-wide EBIT profit margin remained broadly unchanged in Q3 relative to a year ago, at a robust 14.7% of revenues.

It said a decline in the margin in the North American region was partly offset by increases elsewhere.

The asscoaciation said industry-wide passenger yields are currently broadly unchanged from where they were a year ago.

It said against a backdrop of robust global economic growth, and rising input costs, it forecast yields to rise modestly in 2018.

“Indeed, oil prices continued to trend upwards into the New Year, driven by OPEC-led production cuts.

“At the time of writing, the Brent crude oil price is around US$70/bbl – its highest level since December 2014,” said the report.

IATA said that year-on-year growth in both passenger and freight volumes is carrying solid momentum into 2018, alongside elevated load factors: the seasonally adjusted (SA) passenger load factor rose above 82% for the first time on record in November, while the SA freight load factor is continuing to maintain levels last seen in late-2014.

“The ongoing pick-up in global trade conditions is continuing to support premium-class demand, particularly on some key markets to, from, and within the important manufacturing region of Asia,” it said.