This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on August 14, 2019

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd (MAHB) saw a 5.3% increase in passenger traffic in July on the back of higher domestic passenger movements in Malaysia and high growth of international passenger movements for Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen International Airport (SGIA).

MAHB said its network of airports, inclusive of SGIA, recorded 12.53 million passengers in July, from 11.90 million passengers in the same month of last year. This is the highest passenger movement for a month for both the international and domestic sectors, the group said in a filing with Bursa Malaysia.

“The traffic surpassed December passenger movements of previous years where December had always been the highest month for passenger movements,” the group said.

The international sector grew 5.3% to 6.04 million in passengers in July, from 5.73 million in July 2018, whereas the domestic sector also grew 5.3% to 6.49 million passengers from 6.16 million passengers. July’s travel figures bring the airport operator’s year-to-date passenger movements to 80.41 million passengers, a 4.5% increase from 76.92 million passengers seen in the corresponding period last year.

Over 12 months to July, MAHB saw passenger numbers increasing 3.7% to 136.65 million passengers, from 131.73 million posted in the corresponding period last year.

MAHB added that its airports within Malaysia registered 9.19 million passengers in July, an increase of 7.2% from 8.57 million passengers in July 2018. International and domestic sectors recorded 4.7 million and 4.5 million passenger movements, up 2.3% and 12.9% respectively.

“KLIA (Kuala Lumpur International Airport) passenger movements registered a 3.9% growth over July 2018 with 5.5 million passenger movements. A total of 1.9 million passengers were recorded for the Asean destinations while 2.1 million passengers were recorded for the non-Asean destinations. The domestic sector grew by 9.6% with 1.5 million passengers.

The last 12-month passenger movements for KLIA Main Terminal recorded 28.3 million passengers, an increase of 0.4%. klia2 passenger movements increased by 2.3% with 32.5 million passengers.

In the case of Istanbul SGIA, the airport grew 0.4% to 3.33 million passengers in July, from 3.32 million posted in July last year.

MAHB’s share price closed 2.24% or 19 sen lower yesterday at RM8.31, valuing the group at RM13.79 billion.