Air Canada bookings come roaring back, but headwinds slow the carrier's ascent

Air Canada more than tripled its revenues last quarter as demand for travel revved up, though a net loss of nearly $1b signalled the pandemic recovery is far from complete. After the Omicron variant of COVID-19 slowed bookings in January, the airline's sales spiked in March as travel restrictions eased, pushing bookings to 90% of 2019 levels. “We are very positive on the rest of the year and continued growth over the next several years,” CEO Michael Rousseau told analysts on a conference call Tuesday. The country's largest airline maintained full-year forecasts that capacity will average out at roughly three-quarters of what it was in 2019. However, Air Canada's capacity continues to lag its US counterparts and business travel remains at half the volume it hit three years ago, said CCO Lucie Guillemette. “International might take a little bit longer,” she said, referring to overseas business bookings, even as domestic and leisure travel ramp up. Air Canada hopes to take advantage of a renewed appetite for corporate travel in the United States as the carrier shores up its US flight schedule, she added.<br/>