Fraport 2Q net profit up 3 pc to euro69 million

FRANKFURT: Airport operator Fraport AG said on Thursday the company's second quarter net profit rose 3.3 percent and that it would maintain its 2008 outlook.

Fraport _ which operates Frankfurt International Airport, continental Europe's second largest after Paris' Charles de Gaulle _ said its net profit in the April-June period came in at euro69 million (US$106.3 million) compared with euro66.3 million a year ago.

Revenue, however, fell more than 8 percent to euro516 million (US$795 million) from euro563 million a year ago.
Despite the drop, Fraport said it expects its 2008 pretax profit to be above the euro580.5 million it posted in 2007.

Fraport said its second quarter earnings saw a gain of euro900,000 (US$1.4 million) resulting from the sale of security company ICTS Europe. It expects a further euro41 million (US$63.1 million) payment from the German Federal government to affect earnings positively later this year.

That payment is a guarantee for international capital projects related to Fraport's investment in an airport in the Philippines.

In the first six months of the year, Fraport saw a 10 percent decline in net profit to euro93 million (US$143 million) from euro103 million a year ago, on a 7.1 percent drop in revenue to euro1 billion (US$1.54 billion) from euro1.1 billion.

The 2007 figures were affected by a one-time gain of euro58 million related to the Airrail Center finance lease. The Airrail center is a hotel and office project being constructed atop the airport's main railway station in Frankfurt.

Adjusted to exclude those effects, 2008 first-half revenue was up by 6 per cent, mainly the result of the full consolidation of the Lima, Peru airport investment, and higher sales at the company's retail and properties segment.

That helped push Fraport's shares up more than 6 percent to euro44 (US$67.76) in Frankfurt trading.

From January through June 2008, Fraport recorded 26.3 million passengers at Frankfurt Airport, 2.2 per cent more than in the first six months of 2007.

At Fraport's majority-owned airports which include Frankfurt; Frankfurt-Hahn; Antalya, Turkey; and Lima, Peru, the number of passengers climbed by 3.7 per cent to 37 million in the first half of 2008.