SAO PAULO--Brazilian airlines reduced the number of seats they
offered on domestic flights in October, while overall demand grew,
helping boost the percentage of seats filled, civil aviation agency
Anac said Friday.
Brazilian airlines in October offered 2.1% fewer seats than for
the same month last year, Anac said on its website. Meanwhile, RPK,
or revenue passenger kilometer, a measure of demand, climbed 6.7%.
That helped lift load factor, the percentage of seats filled, to
73.7%, from 67.6% in October 2011. However, load factor slipped
from September, when 75.6% of seats were filled on flights.
Brazil's two biggest airlines were responsible for the pullback
in seat offerings, with leading airline Tam cutting back on supply
by 3.8%. Tam, which merged with Chile's Lan earlier this year to
form regional power Latam Airlines Group SA (LFL, LAN.SN), said it
will cut back on domestic supply by 7% in the first half of next
year.
Gol Linhas Aereas Inteligentes SA (GOL, GOLL4.BR), which
promised a cutback of 5% to 8% in the first half of next year,
reduced October seats by 9.5%, while recently acquired WebJet cut
back 6.8%. WebJet is being phased out and 20 of its planes will be
returned early next year, Gol said earlier this month, leading to
the cutback in supply.
Load factor climbed on the year by about 5 percentage points at
Gol to 70.4%, while for Tam load factor jumped almost 10 percentage
points from October 2011 to 76%.
Azul, which is taking over Trip to consolidate its position as
Brazil's third-biggest airline, once expanded seat offers. The
carrier, which has focused on serving smaller cities that Tam and
Gol don't fly to, offered 11.8% more seats on domestic flights,
while Trip expanded 18%.
Write to Paulo Winterstein at paulo.winterstein@dowjones.com
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