Cathay Pacific loses $703 million in 2021

Hong Kong airline Cathay Pacific reported Wednesday losses of $703 million in 2021, an improvement on the about $2.8 billion lost in the previous year due to the impact of the pandemic.

Still, the airline has suffered this year from the heavy travel restrictions imposed in Hong Kong which, in the image of Beijing, follows a zero covid policy, closed almost entirely to visitors and with a draconian quarantine regime for those arriving in the city still in place, AFP reported.

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The average number of daily passengers in 2021 was 1,965, about 717,000 per year, far from the 35.2 million per year carried in 2019 before covid.

The numbers were made up by the good performance of the cargo business especially in the second half of the year, when the airline even made a profit of $255 million.

Photo: Bill Abbott / Wikimedia