PRESS: Vnukovo expects 1.5 bln rbl loss in January–June

MOSCOW, Jun 18 (PRIME) -- Russia’s Vnukovo International Airport expects to suffer a loss of up to 1.5 billion rubles in January–June and the government to provide it with 1 billion rubles of subsidies, the airport’s co-owner Vitaly Vantsev said in an interview to Kommersant business daily published on Thursday.

“We expect (a loss) of about 1.3–1.5 billion rubles by July 1. We will most likely receive about 1 billion rubles of subsidies from the government, so the net loss would stand at about 300–500 million rubles,” he said.

The airport will not have a net profit in 2020. “We expect that we will just break even this year. But it will happen only if international flights restart on July 15,” he said.

There are two alternative scenarios. Under the first, international flights will start close to this autumn, and under the negative forecast, a second wave of the coronavirus epidemic and expansion of restrictions for transportation will occur, meaning significant losses for the airport. Vnukovo was built to devote about half of its areas to international flights, this is why half of the airport will be in downtime if the flights are not resumed, Vantsev said.

(69.4822 rubles – U.S. $1)

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