The three Mexican airport groups -GAP, ASUR and OMA- had, in the first quarter, net profits of 6,632 million pesosthis in an environment marked by the decrease in national operations in the country and the increase in international flights which have left larger commercial income for airport concessionaire companies.
The opening of new businesses and larger restaurant areas in the country’s airport terminals have benefited airport groups, which increased their net income by 7.7 percent on average with respect to the profit result obtained in the first quarter of 2023.
And the first quarter of the year in Mexico is typically a period of low demand, but the holiday period Easter in March, benefited the results of the concessionaires airports.
The Southeast Airport Group (ASUR) was the company that obtained the greatest profit in said period, with a increase in net income of 22.6 percent with respect to the previous year.
“International traffic pays more for the additional space we have to facilitate customs and immigration. And that is why there is probably an increase,” mentioned Adolfo Castro, general director of ASUR in a call with analysts.
The income of The three airport groups had a growth of 9.3 percent in the first quarter of the year, driven mainly by OMA, whose billing expansion grew 16 percent compared to the same period of the previous year.
In addition to airport revenues, Air terminals feed their finances with other services that are provided in the vicinity of air ports, such such as restaurants and hotelsa line of business that drove the growth of OMA’s turnover.
“Car and restaurant rentals benefited from the opening and consolidation of new business units at our airports during recent quarters. Hotel services were the ones that contributed the most to this growth, mainly as a result of an increase in the operation of two hotels,” explained Ricardo Dueñas, general director of OMA.
This group, furthermore, has had to face the drop of around 50 percent in operations at the Acapulco Airportthe tourist destination that suffered onslaught of Hurricane “Otis” and which has seen a considerable drop in tourist activity.
He Pacific Airport Group (GAP)on the other hand, had mixed results: although it registered a net profit During the first trimester, this had a reduction of 3.6 percent compared to the same period last year.
The company’s aeronautical revenues had a decrease of 1.2 percent, this due to discounts in the maximum authorized fare during the quarter; nevertheless, non-aeronautical revenues increased more than 15 percent.
“For the first time in the history of the company we reached 109 pesos per passenger. As we have mentioned previously, we renewed several of the tenant contracts, which resulted in more than positive financial conditions for the company. The main income generated by commercial income was the additional capacity of the (Guadalajara) airport with expansion in terms of square meters,” said Raúl Revuelta, general director of GAP.
The manager indicated that passenger traffic during the first quarter slowed down due to the revisions of Pratt & Whitney engines.
Projects in the making
Subject to airport groups present their master development plans between 2024 and 2025, have drawn up expansion plans for their terminals to prepare for the growth in demand and the recovery of supply from Mexican companies at the end of the following year.
According to Revuelta, one of the airports that will need a large investment and the development of spaces will be Tijuana.
“The biggest investment that we will see in our largest airports will be in the expansion of the Tijuana terminal, a new one in Guadalajara and expansions in terminals 2 and 1 in Cabo,” the manager explained.
ASUR plans to expand Terminal 4 in Cancunin addition to the reconstruction of 1, the oldest in the same air port.
In addition, its director detailed, the expansion of the terminal in Oaxaca will be carried out. All works are outside the area of operation, so no impact is expected.
OMA, for its part, is working on the expansion and remodeling of the terminal A building of the Monterrey Airportas well as in the terminal buildings of Ciudad Juárez, Torreón, Culiacán and Durango.
“Given the expansions we are finishing, probably at the Monterrey airport, we expect the solid performance to continue in the following quarters,” Dueñas noted.
