Despite the airport’s record breaking results, a minus of as much as 54 million kuna remains…
As Josip Bohutinski/VL/Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 21st of September, 2018, from year to year, Croatian airports across the country are continuing to break records, this year, more than 10 million passengers will pass through them, equal to about 500,000 more people than last year.
Split Airport and Zagreb’s Franjo Tuđman Airport see the majority of these passengers pass through, and for the first time in Zagreb, Zagreb Airport has managed to exceed the three million passenger mark in just one year, while Split Airport is on track to achieve that later this year. Naturally, the growing number of passengers brings even higher income, Split Airport’s income soared to 370.9 million kuna last year, up by 55 million kuna more than 2016. In addition, it achieved record profits of as much as 117 million kuna, which is 22 million kuna more than the year before.
On the other hand, Zagreb International Airport reported revenues of 462 million kuna, while in 2016, the airport collected revenues of a much larger 1.16 billion kuna. There was also a loss of 54 million kuna, while just one year before, the airport reported profits of 38 million kuna. The results of the concessionaire’s business operations at the airport, which has been recording steady growth, have left a great many confused.
Zagreb International Airport has explained that their total operating income for 2016 includes revenue from the construction of a new passenger terminal in the amount of 768.3 million kuna, which, according to international accounting standards, must be recognised in the construction period as both revenue and as expenses in the same amount.
Without this revenue, they continued, the total business income of the company for 2016 amounts to 398.7 million kuna and represents the real business activity of the company. By the same logic, total operating income without the construction income for 2017 amounts to 408.3 million kuna.
They added that, consequently, profits did indeed fall somewhat sharply. In this regard, the change in the trends from positive profits to negative results is not actually related to revenues, as business revenues that exclude the aforementioned terminal construction have risen. The main driver of these rather negative results is the beginning of the depreciation of long-term assets and a new passenger terminal, which opened back in March 2017.
The second reason is the financial cost of interest (rates) which is no longer capitalised after the expiration of the terminal’s construction period, and the third reason is related to the transfer of the airport’s old business to the new passenger terminal, the testing and preparation of the new terminal, and finally, the purchase of specific equipment.
“After a successful transfer of operations to the new terminal in 2017, we expect that with the increasing traffic, profitable business, and consequently net profit with a certain time lag, will produce steady and continuous growth over the coming years,” they concluded from Zagreb Airport.
Click here for the original article by Josip Bohutinski/VL/Poslovni Dnevnik
