World airline industry in cyclical upswing - but in search of USD125 billion annually in financing

IATA's recent revision to its airline industry financial forecast grabbed headlines for downgrading the profit outlook for 2014. However, as IATA pointed out, "we continue to expect a significant improvement in airline profits this year compared to 2013". Moreover, Jan-2014 data show that premium traffic is on a rising trend. It does seem that the global economic cycle is turning upwards and CAPA's Capacity Index supports the view that the sector is in a cyclical upswing.

However, the industry is forecast to generate a net profit in 2014 of only USD5.65 per departing passenger. With a record order backlog and annual deliveries of USD125 billion or more to fund over the next decade alone, this throws out a challenge to the world's aviation financiers.

Lessors, banks, ECAs, capital markets and newer sources of finance will all continue to play their part in meeting this challenge. Representatives of all these sources of aircraft finance, plus aircraft operators and manufacturers, will discuss these themes at CAPA Airline Fleet and Finance Summit Asia 2014 in Singapore from 25-Mar-2014 to 26-Mar-2014.