Greece’s Aegean Airlines, riding a strong wave of inbound tourism, reported its third straight profitable quarter this week. For the three months ending in December, Aegean earned a 2 percent operating margin, a full point better than what it earned in the same quarter of 2019.
Greece is a highly seasonal airline market, and one typically defined by very strong profits in the summer but losses during the winter. Any fourth quarter profit is thus considered a victory. In Aegean’s case, its Q4 strength follows an extremely strong summer quarter, in which operating margin reached 29 percent, one of the highest figures for any airline worldwide. Only Ryanair and Turkey’s Pegasus did better that quarter.