Israel's El Al sees revenue fly as travel recovers

El Al reported a Q4 net profit and forecast that annual revenue will jump 75% by 2028 as travel is rebounding strongly from the pandemic and the carrier plans to expand routes to Asia. CE Dina Ben-Tal Ganancia said El Al was looking to resume flights to India and add flights to Australia, and possibly the Philippines, Singapore and Maldives at some point, and plans to expand its Boeing 787 fleet to 22 by 2028 from 16 currently. Helped by a $9m capital gain, Israel's flag carrier said it earned $8.5m between October and December, compared with a $110m loss in the same period a year earlier and a $31m loss in Q4 2019, before the pandemic hit travel. It was the first time since 2015 that El Al has posted a Q4 profit. Revenue jumped to $561m in the final three months of 2022 from $265m in the same period a year earlier - when Israel still had strict travel restrictions in place due to COVID-19 - and topping the $518m in Q4 of 2019. "You see what we call revenge tourism and there is more demand than supply," Ben-Tal Ganancia told Reuters on the sidelines of a news conference. She noted that the pandemic allowed El Al - which changed ownership in 2020, received government bailouts and slashed its workforce to 4,400 from 6,300 - to become more efficient.<br/>