Sydney Airport Traffic - December 2012

18-Jan-2013

Sydney Airport served a total of 36.9 million passengers during 2012, a record for the airport.

This represents total passenger growth of 3.6% over the year. December was the airport's busiest month on record, with passenger numbers growing by 5.2%.

CEO Kerrie Mather said "I am pleased to announce a very positive finish to 2012, with more passengers through the airport in the month of December than ever before. A record 36.9 million passengers through the airport in 2012 is an exceptional result, driven by growth in both international and domestic travel. It was exciting to see such a significant increase in both international and domestic low cost carrier capacity, in particular Scoot, Jetstar and AirAsia X internationally and the expansion of domestic services by Jetstar and Tiger.

"International traffic continued to perform strongly, growing by 5.8% during December and 5.3% over the year driven by the rebound in international tourism/inbound growth (+4.8% for the full year). In particular Malaysian and Singaporean passengers grew 59% and 34% for the month respectively. Australian outbound travel grew by 6.5% for the month, and 5.9% for the full year. The outbound increase was driven by travel to South East Asian destinations such as Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand, as well as travel further afield to locations such as the UAE, USA, UK and Japan.

"Domestic passengers grew by a solid 4.8% for the month and 2.7% over the year. Airline seat capacity was the key driver of the domestic result, with Tiger and Jetstar once again providing the largest contributions to seat and passenger growth over the month. Tiger and Jetstar have increased seat capacity materially over 2012 with both airlines introducing new routes and increasing frequencies on existing routes."
Key Points

• Total passenger traffic for December is estimated to have increased 5.2% on the pcp, with domestic traffic estimated to be up 4.8% on the pcp and international traffic (excluding domestic on-carriage) up 5.8% on the pcp
• For international traffic, the major nationality markets that grew included Australia (+6%), Malaysia (+59%), Singapore (+34%), India (+15%), China (+8%), Germany (+6%), Canada (+5%), Japan (+5%), the USA (+3%), New Zealand (+2%) and the UK (+1%). France (-11%) and Indonesia (-3%) were the major nationality markets that declined
• China Eastern commenced direct A330-300 flights between Sydney and Nanjing three times a week on 21 December 2012. China Eastern now operates a total of 12 weekly services from Sydney, maintaining Sydney Airport's position as the number one gateway airport for Chinese visitors
• Tiger Airways commenced five weekly flights to Mackay on 17 December 2012, and now has four A320 aircraft based in Sydney.