Etihad Airways, the national carrier of the United Arab Emirates, today announced record financial results for 2013, with net profit up 48 per cent to US$62 million on revenues up 27 per cent to US$6.1 billion.

The record performance also saw earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) up 22 per cent to US$208 million and earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, amortisation and rentals (EBITDAR) up 30 per cent to US$979 million, a margin of 16 per cent of total revenues.

This marked the third successive year of net profitability, in the airline's tenth year of operation.

James Hogan, President and Chief Executive Officer of Etihad Airways, said:

"This is another important step forward in our journey as a growing, commercially successful business.  We have hit every financial target for each of the last seven years, bringing sustainable profitability to a business which has grown from just US$300 million in revenues in 2005 to more than US$6 billion today.

"We have delivered that through our unique strategy, which has seen us combine industry-leading organic growth with wide-ranging partnerships and minority equity investments in strategically important carriers around the world.

"This journey has seen us evolve from a highly successful airline into a growing aviation and travel group, with the infrastructure and strategy to develop even further in our second decade.

"We are particularly pleased to deliver a return for our shareholder, while also playing a major role in the development of trade and tourism within the emirate of Abu Dhabi."

Revenue increased by 27 per cent to US$6.1 billion (2012: US$4.8 billion), on passenger numbers up 12 per cent 11.5 million (10.3 million).

Revenue Passenger Kilometres (RPKs) – measuring passenger journeys - increased by 16 per cent to 55.5 billion (47.7 billion), while Available Seat Kilometres (ASKs) – representing capacity - grew by 17 per cent to 71.1 billion (61 billion).

These figures reflected strong growth in passenger traffic volumes, in a year when Etihad Airways added six new destinations – Washington DC, Amsterdam, Sao Paulo, Belgrade, Ho Chi Minh City and Sana'a - and increased capacity on 18 existing routes. At year's end, the average network-wide seat load factor was 78 per cent, unchanged from 2012.

The airline has announced nine new destinations for 2014 – the US cities of Los Angeles and Dallas-Fort Worth, the European gateways of Rome and Zurich, Jaipur in India, Perth in Western Australia, Phuket in Thailand, Medina in Saudi Arabia and Yerevan in Armenia. 

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