(new: statements from conference call on cost-cutting measures, wage agreement at Eurowings, Ita takeover, share price)

FRANKFURT (dpa-AFX) - Lufthansa is going on a cost-cutting course after the expensive strikes at the beginning of the year. CEO Carsten Spohr announced a hiring freeze in administration on Tuesday, despite the strong bookings for the summer. Spohr said at the presentation of the figures for the first quarter in Frankfurt that savings had to be made in all areas that did not directly affect customers.

In principle, the company had resolved to manage with 20 percent fewer managers and employees in the administrative areas compared to 2019. The high strike costs would also have to be recouped through increased productivity.

Tickets for Group companies such as Swiss, Austrian, Eurowings and Lufthansa will remain scarce and expensive this summer. However, he does not foresee any further price increases, but rather a flattening of prices, said Spohr and expressed his conviction: "It will be another very strong travel summer." Bookings for the warm half of the year are 16 percent higher than in 2023, which promises "highly profitable growth". It will certainly be another "very, very good year" for the Lufthansa Group. The new "Allegris" cabin interior, which will be launched on the first long-haul aircraft on May 1, should also help.

However, Spohr has ruled out an operating profit at the previous year's level for 2024. In mid-April, Lufthansa's top management was forced to slash its profit target by half a billion euros due to the negative impact of the ongoing strikes and poorer airfreight business. Instead of around EUR 2.7 billion as in 2023, the adjusted operating result (adjusted EBIT) is only expected to reach EUR 2.2 billion in the current year. In the seasonally weak first quarter, the operating loss tripled to 849 million euros compared to the same quarter of the previous year.

The fact that the Group will only be able to fly 92 percent of its capacity from the last pre-corona year 2019 due to the strike cancellations, faltering aircraft deliveries and more cautious capacity planning contributes to the lower profit expectations. Spohr had originally targeted 94 percent for the year as a whole. In the busy third quarter, it is now expected to be more than 95%.

The company put the costs of the various strikes at around 450 million euros. Of this, 350 million euros were already incurred in the first quarter, when the company's own ground staff and cabin crews, as well as security staff at many airports, went on strike.

On Tuesday, Spohr reported on a fresh wage agreement with the pilots of the subsidiary Eurowings until the end of 2026, which had been reached without any strikes. Contracts have now been concluded for the vast majority of employees. "There will be collective bargaining peace for the next few years," said Spohr confidently. The Vereinigung Cockpit pilots' union confirmed the agreement on a key points paper.

Spohr criticized the European Commission for imposing conditions that would make the urgently needed consolidation of European aviation more difficult. This refers to the German group's planned acquisition of the Italian state airline Ita, on which the EU Commission intends to make a decision by June 13 following an extension of the deadline.

The Lufthansa Group still has until May 6 to dispel competition concerns with commercial concessions. The authority fears that the Lufthansa Group will gain an overweight position on individual routes and airports. Spohr made it clear that his company had no "Plan B" for the Ita takeover in the event of a negative decision from Brussels. The aim was to create a better offer for Italian customers on long-haul and short-haul routes. "But it must also be worthwhile for us."

The news was greeted with indecision on the stock market: Lufthansa's share price initially fell by more than one and a half percent in the morning and later climbed by a similar margin. In the early afternoon, the share was slightly in the profit zone and thus in the midfield of the MDax. Since the turn of the year, however, the share price has fallen by around 16 percent./stw/ceb/jha/