KUALA LUMPUR (Nov 11): Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd (MAHB) saw a 9.2% increase in passenger traffic in October 2019 — the highest growth recorded so far this year.  

The passenger traffic including that of Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen International Airport (SGIA) grew to 11.7 million, according to a filing with Bursa Malaysia today.

MAHB said the international and domestic passenger movements registered growth of 11% and 7.5%, with 5.6 million and 6.1 million passengers respectively in October.

“October 2019 passenger movements for the network of airports continued to maintain the growth momentum (that) picked up in June. In particular, the international growth of passengers in both absolute and percentage points was encouraging,” MAHB said.

On a 12-month basis, total MAHB network of airports registered 5.2% or 6.88 million passengers growth to 139.2 million passengers. This is the highest absolute volume y-o-y increase recorded on a 12-month basis.

Overall, aircraft movements increased by 4.1% with international and domestic aircraft movements up by 5.5% and 3.2% respectively year-on-year.

On the local front, Malaysia's passenger movements grew 10% in October 2019, the highest monthly growth.

The international sector saw 7.8% growth — the highest increase for the year both in absolute and growth percentage terms, while the domestic sector sustained a double-digit growth at 12.3%, MAHB wrote.

This is evident from the high increase of average load factor by 2.7 percentage point for both sectors, MAHB said.

KLIA passenger movements accordingly climbed 9.3%, registering 5.1 million passengers in October 2019, with international and domestic passenger movements increased by 9.5% and 8.8% y-o-y respectively.

KLIA Main Terminal and klia2 passenger movements increased by 12% and 6.9% respectively, MAHB said.

The last-twelve-month passenger movement for KLIA Main Terminal increased 2.6% to 28.9 million passengers, while klia2 rose 4.3% with 33 million passenger movements over the same period last year.

“Overall aircraft movements at KLIA increased by 3.8% over October 2018. International and domestic aircraft movements at KLIA registered an increase of 2.5% and 6.7% respectively,” MAHB said.

Meanwhile, Istanbul SGIA passenger movements registered 3.1 million passengers, 7.1% higher over the same month in 2018.

“The overall performance of passenger movements was contributed by the sustained demand for air travel, supported by an increase in airlines and frequencies, as well as the addition of new routes,” MAHB said.

Shares of MAHB dropped 14 sen or 1.65% to RM8.35 today, valuing the company at RM13.85 billion.