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Wizz Air said Wednesday it had benefitted from the troubles of other airlines to grow more quickly than expected, although concerns over future costs took the shine off record quarterly results. Wizz Air CE Jozsef Varadi said the collapse of Monarch last year had allowed the airline to expand operations at London Luton airport, while it had also moved capacity into Vienna after Air Berlin went into administration. “We are growing more than what we would have expected even six months ago,” he said. The Eastern-European focused carrier said it had nudged up its full-year capacity growth forecast to 24% from 23%. Wizz secured Monarch’s take-off and landing slots at Luton airport in November. Wizz said it carried 24% more passengers in the three months to Dec. 31, its fiscal Q3. Profit was a record E14m, up 3.6%. The airline maintained its outlook for full-year net profit in range of E265-280m. After a strong run that saw the stock double last year and hit a record high on Monday, Wizz shares fell 2.2% in early trade. Analysts at Goodbody said that while Q3 was strong, an unchanged outlook implied Q4 would be worse than expected, and added the airline could face headwinds from rising fuel costs. “The immediate focus on growth vs yields, and the comparative under-hedged fuel position means we leave our recommendation as Hold,” the Goodbody analysts said.<br/>

Ryanair Holdingssaid it will go ahead with plans to stamp tickets with a warning that flights from the UK may not be able to operate in the immediate aftermath of the country exiting the EU. The Irish discount carrier has been outspoken in suggesting that Britons may have to resort to ferry journeys to get abroad if work on new air-service agreements isn’t accelerated. Ryanair will need to add the caveat to its tickets from September, when summer 2019 flights go on sale, CMO Kenny Jacobs said Wednesday. “If we don’t have any new news between now and then, we’ll need to work out the wording,” he said. “We hope we don’t have to, that we do see some kind of clarity.” Like other airlines, Ryanair will have to refund fares if flights are suspended after Brexit is implemented next spring. <br/>

Ryanair has pledged to become “plastic free” in the next five years, with the airline set to trumpet its relative green credentials as part of its ongoing makeover. The Ryanair CE, Michael O’Leary, has famously suggested shooting environmentalists, and repeatedly denies climate change is driven by carbon emissions, which aviation produces in abundance. However, Ryanair has promised to eliminate nonrecyclable plastics from its operations by 2023. It will also introduce a voluntary carbon offset payment for customers when booking. As well as switching to biodegradable cups, wooden cutlery and paper packaging onboard, Ryanair said it would make its head offices, bases and operations plastic free. The CMO, Kenny Jacobs, said Ryanair’s environmental plan “includes our commitment to eliminate all nonrecyclable plastics from our operations over the next five years”. He suggested customers could bring their own cups aboard, but added: “It’s not just inflight food and drink. We’re looking at the plastic parts within the aircraft and what’s nonrecylable and how do we work with the original equipment manufacturers to move to more recyclable plastics within the aircraft and the operation.”<br/>

Spirit Airlines has reached a five-year tentative agreement with its pilots for pay and benefit increases, the group's union said Wednesday, signalling an end to an acrimonious years-long negotiation. The new contract includes an average pay increase of 43% for the carrier's 1,800 pilots, double-digit contributions to pilots' retirement plans and $75m in ratification compensation. "This tentative agreement represents a positive step toward recognizing our pilots' contributions to the airline," said Stuart Morrison, chairman of the Spirit unit of the Air Line Pilots Association. Contract negotiations had dragged on for nearly three years, the union said. Relations between pilots and management reached a head last summer when Spirit accused pilots of engaging in an illegal work slowdown, resulting in hundreds of flight cancellations and costing the company some $8.5m in revenue. The new Spirit contract is pending pilot approval. Pilots will vote in February on whether to ratify the agreement.<br/>

Flybe is feeling the benefits of a renewed focus on operating costs and fleet trimming. In a 3Q trading update of its 2017-18 financial year, the airline reported a 7.4% rise in revenue, to GBP172.8m, up from GBP160.8m for the year-ago period. Passenger numbers were up 8.1% at 2.3m; combined with a 4.2% drop in capacity at 3m seats, which resulted in a load factor of 75.8%, up from 67.2% a year ago. Passenger yield inched up 0.4% to GBP69.81, while passenger revenue per seat increased 13.3% to GBP52.92. The fleet reduction came with the handing back of four end-of-lease Bombardier Dash 8 Q400s; a further two will leave the fleet before the end of March. “We are making strong progress against our sustainable business improvement plan,” Flybe CEO Christine Ourmieres-Widener said. “During this quarter we continued with our planned fleet and capacity reductions and delivered higher load factors, increased passenger numbers and strong unit revenue performance. We expect this improvement to continue, but at a slightly lower rate in the final quarter of the year,” she said. “As we continue to reduce our fleet size—but face the impact of higher fuel prices and reduced foreign currency exchange hedging gains—we are going to be even more focused on improving our cost base.”<br/>

Spanish LCC Volotea recorded a 42% jump in passenger numbers in 2017, reaching 4.8m, up from 3.4m in 2016, beating the Barcelona-based airline’s predictions. The privately owned airline said revenues increased 22% in 2017 to more than E300m, but did not release profit or loss figures and did not respond to a request for additional details. The carrier specializes in linking secondary and tertiary European cities and now operates across 13 European nations. It plans to launch 58 new routes and three new bases (Athens, Bilbao and Marseilles) in 2018 and anticipates carrying 5.7 to 6m passengers. Passenger loads jumped in 2017, with load factors rising 11% to 86%. The airline will receive four new Airbus A319s this year, taking its total fleet to 32 aircraft. It is steadily switching over to the larger A319 from its previous Boeing 717 fleet.<br/>