The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the economic performance of the European air carriers

Abstract

The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic which was officially declared in March 2020 as a whole new global risk, has negatively affected operations in all industries around the world. Air transport was one of the first sectors to be affected the most by this event as the disease has been easily transmittable among people. As a measure to prevent the spread of the disease, governments around the world have severely restricted international commercial air traffic. These travel measures have significantly reduced the market value of airlines operating scheduled passenger air services worldwide, where operations have had to be largely limited or even canceled by air carriers. These facts motivate to research the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the performance of air carriers, which is also the main aim of this paper. This paper examines the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak on 15 European airlines using economic analysis of the influence of the determining factors.