Frankfurt airport operator Fraport remained in the red despite the recovery in passenger traffic in the first quarter.

Because the group wrote off almost 50 million euros on a loan in connection with its stake in the Russian airport in St. Petersburg, the shareholders suffered a loss of around 108 million euros, as Fraport announced in Frankfurt on Tuesday. For the year as a whole, CEO Stefan Schulte in Frankfurt continues to expect demand to recover to between 39 and 46 million passengers. He expects to be in the black both in day-to-day business and on the bottom line.

In the first quarter, sales rose surprisingly sharply by 40 percent to almost 540 million euros compared to the same period of the previous year, which was characterized by the lockdown. Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization rose by a good three quarters to almost 71 million euros, but fell short of analysts' expectations.

“Despite the omicron virus variant and new geopolitical uncertainties, significantly more people are once again traveling by plane. The number of passengers is increasing group-wide and so we were able to significantly improve our operating result in the first quarter of the current year. In Frankfurt, the good booking figures for the summer make us optimistic that we will see around 55 to 65 percent of the passenger numbers of the pre-corona level over the year. Nevertheless, the Ukraine war also affects our business. Nevertheless, we are still planning a clearly positive business development for the year as a whole and confirm the given outlook," says Stefan Schulte, CEO of Fraport AG.