According to a press release sent out by the company, the results of the SATA group (which includes Azores Airlines and SATA Air Açores) showed an “improvement of 16 million euros over the same period last year” in the first half of the year, with a positive operating result before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of 3.6 million euros.

In the first six months of the year, the group increased its revenue by 40 million euros (compared to the first half of last year) and carried one million passengers (36% more than in the same period of the previous year).

In the second quarter of 2023, Azores Airlines achieved revenue of 75.1 million euros, representing an increase of 28 million and 32.2 million compared to the same periods in 2022 and 2019 (pre-pandemic), respectively.

Azores Airlines achieved a profit of 2.2 million euros in the second quarter of this year, compared to a loss of 26 million euros in 2022.

In the second quarter, the EBITDA of the SATA company responsible for connections between the Azores and outside the archipelago was 11.6 million euros, an improvement on the same period last year, when the result was a loss of 6.2 million euros.

Earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) for the second quarter were positive by 3.6 million euros (an improvement on the negative 13.1 million euros in the same quarter last year), which “exceeded the company’s expectations.”

In the second quarter of 2023, Azores Airlines (a company undergoing privatization) carried 383,000 passengers, an increase of 39% compared to the same period last year.

However, in the total for the first half of 2023, the company’s net result is “negative by 20.5 million euros”, which is due to a “weaker first quarter in terms of operations, “high financial expenses”, “restructuring costs” and “exchange rate differences”.

SATA Air Açores (the group company responsible for inter-island connections) lost 4.3 million euros in the second quarter of this year. In the same period last year, the result had been positive by two million euros.

“In the first half of 2023, the net result [of SATA Air Açores] is negative by 11.4 million euros, which compares with a positive net result of 1.6 million euros in the same period last year,” said the company.

EBITDA was 1.2 million euros in the second quarter of this year, while in the second quarter of 2022, it was 2.8 million euros.

“The increase in capacity with the seventh aircraft was one of the factors that led to [SATA Air Açores’] EBITDA being negative by around 55,000 euros in the first half of 2023, negatively impacted by the result of the first quarter,” the company explains.

SATA Air Açores achieved revenues of 25.7 million euros (10% more than in the same period last year) and increased the number of passengers carried (256,000, representing a 20% increase) in the second quarter.

A Lusa news story in Açoriano Oriental – Paulo Simões, director

Translated to English as a community outreach program from the Portuguese Beyond Borders Institute (PBBI) and the Modern and Classical Languages and Cultures Department (MCLL) as part of Bruma Publication and ADMA (Azores-Diaspora Medial Alliance)  at California State University, Fresno.