The Lufthansa subsidiary Swiss was able to reduce the loss to 427,7 million Swiss francs in the previous year. The first Corona year had to be closed with a minus of 653,8 million Swiss francs. Operating income was 13,7 percent higher than in 2020 and is reported at 2,1 billion Swiss francs.

In addition, Swiss benefited from an increase in supply, especially in the summer months, and continued very strong demand for freight. Still, they were below half of the pre-crisis level of 2019.

As expected, it was not possible in the fourth quarter to repeat the black figures of the third quarter due to seasonal factors. Nevertheless, Swiss was able to substantially improve the operating result compared to the same period of the previous year, it was CHF – 36,3 million and thus more than CHF 200 million above the previous year’s figure (Q4 2020: CHF – 239,1 million). In the same period, the Lufthansa subsidiary was able to significantly increase its operating income. It amounted to CHF 734,6 million and has thus more than doubled compared to the previous year (Q4 2020: CHF 310,9 million).

"With the transformation that we successfully started in 2021, we are well positioned to continue to be successful in the market. Now it's a matter of continuing the transformation: This year the focus is on increasing our capacities by up to 2019 percent compared to 80 and increasing the stability of our flight schedule," says CEO Dieter Vranckx.

According to their own information, the loan of 1,5 billion Swiss francs guaranteed by the Confederation has never been used more than half. Repayments could be made towards the end of the year.

“Thanks to the restructuring, we can sustainably save CHF 500 million in costs. In addition, we managed to stop the outflow of funds over the course of the year and even generate a positive cash flow over the entire year. We have thus created good conditions for the financial recovery of Swiss," explains CFO Markus Binkert.

Carried around six million passengers

In 2021, Swiss transported almost six million passengers, 22,6 percent more than in the previous year. SWISS operated a total of 56.372 flights, which corresponds to an increase of 17,3 per cent compared to the previous year. The carrier offered a total of 2021 percent more seat kilometers (ASK) across the entire route network in 22,7, while the number of revenue seat kilometers (RPK) rose by 15,2 percent in the same period. The average seat load factor was 54,4 per cent, down 3,6 percentage points on the previous year. On European routes, it was still well above the value for long-haul routes.

In order to counter the structural changes in the market resulting from the corona pandemic, Swiss introduced a comprehensive transformation program called "reach" in 2021. As part of this, SWISS is reducing the fleet by around 15 per cent and, as planned, by the end of the year had eliminated around 1.700 full-time positions, two thirds of which were through voluntary measures and natural fluctuation. Investments in the product, such as the incorporation of the Airbus A320neo or the introduction of the premium economy, form other central pillars of the transformation program in addition to innovative sustainability projects. In addition, there are extensive network optimizations in order to be able to design the leisure and business travel offer even more flexibly in close cooperation with Edelweiss. "We are on course to adapt our company to the changed circumstances by 2023 and to restore Swiss's competitiveness in the long term," says Vranckx with satisfaction.