Auckland International Airport reported a higher reported profit for the six months ended December, helped by the ongoing success of Queenstown Airport.
AIA’s reported profit of $250.1million for the first six months of the financial year was up 6% on the $235.9million reported in the previous corresponding period (pcp).
The company paid higher tax in the period of $54.5million for a reported profit after tax of $169.9million, up 17% on the pcp.As is the case for many listed companies, AIA also reported an underlying profit after tax, up 7.8% at $133.1million.
Revenue was up nearly 7% at $332.4million and the interim dividend rose 0.75c per share to 10.75c, imputed to the company tax rate of 28%.
Queenstown Airport reported an operating profit of $17million for the six months, a rise of nearly 30%, and an underlying profit of $8.8million, of which AIA received $2.2mil-lion for its 25% share.
Chairman Sir Henry van der Heyden said AIA’s total share of the underlying profit from associates was $11.2million, up 47.4%. The underlying profit share from Queenstown Airport increased 46.7% to $2.2million and the share from the Novotel hotel was up 120% at $2.2million. The profit share from North Queensland Airports grew by 33.3% to $6.8million.
Queenstown Airport experienced strong passenger growth in the first six months of the 2018 financial year. Domestic passenger numbers increased 14% to 751,056 and international passenger numbers were up 11% at 333,439.
"Like Auckland Airport, Queenstown Airport has continued to focus on upgrading its airport infrastructure and providing a high-quality customer experience during the airport’s development."
In December 2017, Queenstown Airport opened its first dedicated operations centre and installed new sensor technology to provide customers with real-time car-parking information, Sir Henry said.
Queenstown Airport also successfully completed a three-month public and stakeholder engagement process on its 30-year master plan.
Reviewing the period, Sir Henry said the company continued to invest more than $1million each working day on its core airport infrastructure and there were now 53 aeronautical projects under way across the airport, each worth more than $1million.
Improving travel times and flows around the airport remained a top priority for Auckland Airport. It completed several transport infrastructure projects, including improving access to the domestic forecourt for passengers, commercial transport operators and buses, together with a new outbound bus lane in Tom Pearce Dr.
The property business continued to grow and in the past six months a new 6000sq m building had been completed to house the Ministry for Primary Industries, along with a new 7000sq m warehouse and office facility for international freight-forward specialist Rohlig Logistics.
Work continued on the construction of the new 20,000sq m Bunnings distribution centre.
The airport company earlier announced the sale of its interest in North Queensland Airports for $A370 million.
The company indicated full-year profit guidance of between $250 million and $257 million which would deliver earnings per share growth of between 0.6% and 3.5% compared with the 2017 financial year.AIA shares last traded at $6.48.
