Jet2 'encouraged' by early bookings, slightly raises profit guidance

Leisure travel group Jet2 said on Thursday that it was "encouraged" by early bookings for Summer 2024, leading it to "tighten and slightly raise" full-year profit guidance.

Jet2 stated that against a 20.5% increase in on-sale seat capacity, Winter 2023/24 forward bookings had "performed well", with passenger sectors booked currently up by 17% and average pricing for both flight-only and package holiday products "robust".

The London-listed group said the mix of higher margin per passenger package holiday customers was "slightly ahead" of last Winter at approximately 60%.

Jet2 also noted that with February and March bookings displaying "similar trends to recent months" it had opted to "tighten and slightly raise" guidance for group profit before FX revaluation and taxation for the year ending 31 March to between £510.0m-525.0m from £480.0m-520.0m.

The company added that on-sale seat capacity for Summer 2024 was currently 12.5% higher than a year earlier at 17.2m seats. Forward bookings to date were said to be "encouraging", with average load factors 1.5 percentage points ahead of Summer 2023 at the same time. Package holiday customers were up 17%, with the package holiday mix of total departing passengers at approximately 77% - in line with Summer 2023 at the same point in the booking cycle.

As of 0935 GMT, Jet2 shares were up 4.37% at 1,384.0p.

Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com