Ryanair: don't anticipate cancellations this summer

Okay, well, first and foremost, we're coming off our best year ever. You know, we've had record traffic, 208 million passengers. We had record profitability, 2.26 billion. And as we go into FY27, we're particularly well hedged. You know, we're 80% hedged out to the end of March next year, $668 a metric ton, which is actually down on the $760 a metric ton that we were paying last year. We're in obviously very volatile oil markets at the moment. If we go back a couple of months ago, we probably had some concern around oil supply, but we're increasingly confident that there won't be issues in relation to oil into this summer. And you know, who knows beyond that what will happen with the Strait of Hormuz. But we're seeing that the supply chains changing. You know, a lot of our suppliers are now getting their oil in from the Americas, from the likes of Venezuela, the likes of Brazil and elsewhere. Coming in from USA, coming in from the Nordics and indeed from parts of the Middle East and West Africa. So the dependency on the Strait of Hormuz is reducing. We're seeing refineries, as always happens when the price goes up, capacity shifts. So where in the past there was traditionally three to one on gas oil to jet refining, we're now seeing one to one on the refining. So I think there's an increasing supply of jet fuel and I wouldn't be overly concerned. That said, I think prices will remain higher for longer, which puts Ryanair in a particularly strong position given our strong fuel hedging as I said out to the back end of March and into April of next year. And I think our competitors are going to struggle significantly. They don't have the hedge lines that we have. They don't have the balance sheet that we have and they don't have the cost base that Ryanair has. So I wouldn't be surprised into the winter to see similar as we saw with Spirit in the United States, some European airlines getting themselves into trouble.

Well, I mean, our contingency plan this year is that we're going to carry 216 million passengers, 4% increase. We're not planning for cancellations. Do we have plans for some kind of an Armageddon garden situation? Of course, we do, but I don't see that coming to pass. As things stand, we're operating a full schedule this summer, planned to operate a full schedule into the winter period, which will see us grow by 4% and as I said, carry 216 million passengers, start taking in our Max 10 aircraft in the spring of next year. So, I'm less concerned than I was. That said, you know, who knows what may or may not happen. But based on what we're seeing at the moment, we're very happy to keep things as is.

Yeah, I mean, we haven't promised no price increases. Ryanair operates a load active, yield passive strategy, which means we price to fill the planes and the consumers pretty much decide what our pricing's going to be. I'm over 23 years in Ryanair and we've never had a fuel surcharge. We don't plan to put one on, but I think it's inevitable the prices will go up in the market and I suppose the one key message I would give to customers is, you know, book as quickly as you can before prices do go up later on in the winter period. But as regards our margins, as I said, we've just come off a record year. We're particularly well hedged. We've got the best cost base in Europe. We'll be debt free this time next week when we pay off our final bond. So, Ryanair is going to have a very good year regardless of what happens. It just mightn't be as good as last year.

Well, Ryanair typically gets involved in consolidations as the remedy maker. You know, our preferred form of growth is organic. We buy aircraft at the right price. We've got 300 brand new Max 10 aircraft coming in from the spring of next year. 20% more seats, 20% more fuel efficient. So we will continue to grow from 208 million passengers last year to 300 million passengers growing organically and stepping in to help where there's competition overlap in relation to remedies on M&A. We've got the TAP acquisition underway in Portugal at the moment for example. There'll inevitably be some competition issues there. Ryanair will be able to help out in Lisbon and elsewhere. But I think we will see some of the weaker carriers who were already struggling before the war possibly go to the wall in the winter.

The booking is closer in. I think some of that was down to fears around whether, you know, there'd be an availability of fuel. I would emphasize we expect no issue in the short to medium term on the fuel side and probably beyond. About 700 million people a night are booking with Ryanair. So there's no shortage of bookings coming through. We're very much on track to deliver the 216 million passengers this year profitably and I think consumers are getting a bit more confident. That said, that doesn't rule out the risk that there may be interest rate hikes, there may be economic shocks. And again, what typically happens in that scenario is that people trade down. And they prioritize a holiday, but they do it with Ryanair because we've got the lowest fares and we've got the lowest costs.

At all. In fact, honestly, they left us short 29 aircraft last summer, but they did a phenomenal job over the winter getting us those 29 aircraft that we had all of the 210 game-changers, as we called them, in the fleet by the end of February this year. So, we're now operating all of those fuel-efficient larger aircraft this summer. And I'm getting increasingly excited at the prospect of the Max 10 getting certified towards the end of the summer. And the first 15 of those aircraft arriving in ahead of the summer of next year. So, Boeing are doing a great job. Stephanie Pope and Seattle, Kelly Ortberg have definitely turned things around. And I'm delighted to continue to work with them.