IndiGo gains 3% as December quarter profit jumps 2-fold, pares gains later

Shares of InterGlobe Aviation, the parent company of budget carrier IndiGo, soared over 3 per cent to Rs 1,541.2 on the BSE on Thursday after the company reported a steep rise in profit after tax (PAT) at Rs 496 crore for the quarter ended December 2019, mainly helped by higher income. The company had a profit after tax of Rs 185.2 crore in the year-ago period.

The company's total income surged a robust 25.5 per cent to Rs 10,330.2 crore in the latest December quarter from Rs 8,229.3 crore in the corresponding period a year ago.

Of this, passenger ticket revenue was Rs 8,770.30 crore, an increase of 24.1 per cent y-o-y, while the ancillary revenue during the quarter stood at Rs 1,037.30 crore, registering a growth of 28.8 per cent over the year-ago period, the airline said.

The yield or average ticket price increased 2.1 per cent in the December quarter to Rs 3.88 per km, from Rs 3.83 per km in the third quarter of 2018-19. At the same time, the fuel cost reduced 2 per cent to Rs 334.19 crore as compared to Rs 341.04 crore, as per the filing.

"I am very enthusiastic about the way we have been developing our network, connecting cities, large and small, to provide more choice to our customers. We have added small cities, such as Shirdi and Shillong, to our network while extending our reach to major cities such as Hanoi and Guangzhou," IndiGo Chief Executive Officer Ronojoy Dutta said.

The airline started operations on seven new international routes and 17 new domestic routes and operated a peak of 1,634 daily departures during the quarter, he said.

IndiGo added 12 aircraft during the quarter under review. Its fleet had 257 aircraft, comprising 126 A320 Ceos, 96 A320Neos,10 A321Neosand 25 ATRs at the end of December 31, 2019.

By 10:23 AM, the stock had pared all gains on account of profit booking and was trading 0.78 per cent lower at Rs 1481.20 as compared to a flat S&P BSE Sensex. Around 33.9 lakh shares have changed on the counter on the NSE and BSE so far.