Cathay cargo carried up 15% in Sept
Capacity, measured in available cargo tonne kilometres, increased 27% year on year
Cathay Pacific carried 119,963 tonnes of cargo in September 2023, an increase of 15 percent compared with the same period last year.
"The month’s cargo revenue tonne kilometres (RFTKs) increased 17 percent year on year. The cargo load factor decreased by 5.3 percentage points to 61 percent while capacity, measured in available cargo tonne kilometres (AFTKs), increased by 27 percent year on year," says an official release.
In the first nine months of 2023, tonnage increased 20 percent against a 78 percent increase in capacity and a 54 percent increase in RFTKs compared with the same period for 2022.
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Chief Customer and Commercial Officer Lavinia Lau says: "September marked the start of the traditional peak period and demand strengthened across most of the network compared with the previous month. Capacity also grew as passenger services were added on some key cargo routes.
“E-commerce remained a bright spot, particularly on the Americas trade lanes. Our mail business continued to gain momentum with several post offices around the world adopting our newly launched Cathay Mail solution to improve their customer experience."
Outlook
Loads are expected to build over the next two months reflecting the year-end demand, and Cathay has been adding freighter capacity on transpacific routes, Lau added. "Our intermodal sea-air feeder services from Dongguan will continue to see growth in throughput, providing customers a cost-effective option to move freight from the Greater Bay Area to the Hong Kong hub and onto our global network.”
The Cathay Group, on October 11, 2023 announced that shareholder approval had been granted to proceed with a proposed capital reduction, which, when completed, will facilitate the Group to buy back 50 percent – HK$9.75 billion ($1.17 billion)– of the preference shares held by the Hong Kong SAR Government before the end of this year and the remaining 50 percent by the end of July 2024, the release added.
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