Cathay Pacific continued to record cargo growth in June, with a better than expected performance last month, driven by an uptick in pharma shipments.
The Hong Kong flag carrier transported 124,568 tonnes of cargo in June, up 12% year-on-year.
This figure is also higher month-on-month when Cathay transported 121,088 tonnes of cargo in May. June's performance was also higher than the 117,428 tonnes of cargo recorded in April.
It was, however, lower than the 134,551 tonnes of cargo that the carrier handled in March 2024.
"June is traditionally a slower month for air cargo; however, demand was stronger than anticipated, and we observed strong year-on-year tonnage growth from Hong Kong, the Chinese Mainland, Japan and Europe in particular," said Lavinia Lau, chief customer and commercial officer at Cathay Pacific.
"Across our network, our tonnage was 3% higher than May and 12% above June last year. In terms of commodity mix, we observed an uptick of pharmaceutical shipments, especially from Europe," she added.
Lau noted that in June, the carrier relaunched Cathay Expert to provide customers with a fully customised handling solution for their odd-size, heavy or fragile cargo and the response from its customers has been positive.
"We observed a 34% tonnage improvement for Cathay Expert compared with the previous month," she said.
For June, cargo revenue tonne kilometres (RFTKs) increased 5.6% year on year.
The cargo load factor decreased by 2.1 percentage points to 59.6%, while available cargo tonne kilometres (AFTKs) increased by 9.4% year on year.
Cathay said that in the first six months of 2024, the tonnage increased by 10.5% to 719,464 tonnes, against an 11.4% increase in AFTKs and a 4.6% increase in RFTKs, compared with the same period in 2023.
Looking ahead, Cathay expects the strong cargo growth to continue through the traditional peak season months.
"For cargo, the second half of the year is the traditional peak period, and we expect the healthy demand we have seen throughout the first half of the year to continue," Lau said.
"Market sentiment, particularly out of Hong Kong and the Chinese Mainland, continues to be positive. We will continue to adjust our freighter capacity to accommodate our customers’ needs, including adding more freighter capacity to the Americas," she added.
Lau also noted that Cathay would buy back the remaining 50%—HK$9.75 billion—of the preference shares issued to the Hong Kong SAR Government as part of our recapitalisation in 2020 and pay any remaining unpaid preference share dividends up to July 31, 2024.
"This will bring the total amount of the preference share dividends paid to the Hong Kong SAR Government over its holding period to HK$2.44 billion. We would like to thank the Hong Kong SAR Government and all shareholders for their invaluable support both during and since the pandemic," the chief customer and commercial officer at Cathay Pacific, further said.
Cargo to remain robust through the peak season
Earlier, Cathay Cargo already signalled a busy peak season this year, with the growth momentum seen in the first half of 2024 expected to continue throughout the year.
Andress Lam, head of cargo digital at Cathay, said the Hong Kong-headquartered airline has so far been busy halfway through the first half of the year.
"Here we are at the halfway point of the year. It has been a busy one so far, and that looks set to continue," she said, speaking at the airline's Cargo Clan publication.
