KUALA LUMPUR (June 10): Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd (MAHB) handled 5.6% more passengers in May 2015, with 7.12 million passengers passing through its 39 airports in the country compared with 6.74 million passengers in May 2014.

Of this total, the airport operator saw 4.1 million passengers pass through the KL International Airport (KLIA) in Sepang in May, a 3.4% rise from 3.96 million a year ago. 

International traffic grew 2.1% to 3.28 million from 3.21 million in May 2014, while domestic traffic rose 8.7% to 3.84 million from 3.53 million during the same period under review.

Overall aircraft movements grew 5.9% year-on-year in May, with domestic and international registering 6.2% and 5.4% increases respectively.

In a filing with Bursa Malaysia today, MAHB said Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen International Airport (Istanbul SGIA) in Turkey alone achieved an overall 23.1% growth in passenger traffic to 2.42 million for May 2015 from 1.97 million in May 2014. Overall aircraft movements grew 21.5% year-on-year.

For the first five months of this year, meanwhile, MAHB saw a marginal 0.7% increase in passengers passing through its 39 airports to 34.33 million from 34.08 million in the year-ago period.

The first five months performance was dragged by a 1.1% contraction in passenger traffic at KLIA to 20.05 million compared with 20.27 million a year ago.

International traffic fell 1.8% to 16.37 million from 16.66 million a year ago, while domestic traffic dropped 3.2% to 17.97 million from 17.41 million in the January-May 2014 period.

MAHB (fundamental: 1; valuation: 1.4) said since Malaysia Airlines (MAS) flight MH370 tragedy last year, the China sector for the first time registered a high positive growth of about 15% in May.

It added that as per the previous months, South Asia and Southeast Asia sectors continued to register positive growth. However, the Middle East sector caused a negative drag on traffic leading to year-on-year decline of about 5% in May.

“Kota Kinabalu International Airport which was most affected by 2014 events, registered the first positive international growth of about 10.3% in May 2015. This was in part facilitated by the move of an airline from the temporary Terminal 2 to the newer and larger Terminal 1,” it said.

Going forward, MAHB said: “At the moment, the impact from MAS restructuring is yet to be known though the initial first few days numbers show neutral impact."

MAHB shares closed 16 sen or 2.52% lower at RM6.19 today, giving it a market capitalisation of RM10.47 billion.

(Note: The Edge Research's fundamental score reflects a company’s profitability and balance sheet strength, calculated based on historical numbers. The valuation score determines if a stock is attractively valued or not, also based on historical numbers. A score of 3 suggests strong fundamentals and attractive valuations.)