Portugal enjoys strong aviation recovery as TAP Air Portugal privatisation nears
Portugal's aviation capacity recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic has been one of the strongest in Europe.
Seat numbers in the week of 21-Aug-2023 reached 111.7% of the equivalent week of 2019, whereas Europe as a whole has not yet returned to 2019 levels.
Portugal's traffic recovery has also been impressive: passenger numbers reached 16.7 million in 2Q2023, which was an increase of 15.3% year-on-year and 9.3% higher than in the equivalent quarter of 2019.
TAP Air Portugal remains the country's largest airline by seats, but LCCs have led the recovery (particularly Ryanair and easyJet) and eroded its seat share.
Meanwhile, the Portuguese government is expected to signal the official launch of TAP's privatisation in the coming months. The airline's strong market position on Europe-Latin America will attract interest from all of Europe's big three legacy airline groups, namely Lufthansa Group, Air France-KLM and IAG.
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