Hot Stock AirAsia X soars 8.3% on positive 4Q operations

by **Cals** Wed 13 Jan 2016, 20:03

Hot Stock
AirAsia X soars 8.3% on positive 4Q operations
By Law Yin-Lyn / theedgemarkets.com | January 13, 2016 : 11:33 AM MYT

KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 13): AirAsia X Bhd (AAX) ([You must be registered and logged in to see this image.] Valuation: 0.30, Fundamental: 0.20) (Valuation: 0.30, Fundamental: 0.20) rose as much as 8.3% or 1.5 sen to 19.5 sen in the late morning today, after its CEO said the airline was operationally positive in the fourth quarter ended Dec 31, 2015.
At 11.07 am, AAX gained one sen to 19 sen with a trading volume of 15.4 million shares, making it the fourth most active counter on the bourse.
AAX expects to return to profit in 2016 — if the ringgit doesn’t weaken to below the 4.40 mark against the US dollar.
Yesterday (Jan 12), its CEO, Benyamin Ismail, said AAX was operationally positive in the fourth quarter ended Dec 31, 2015 (4Q2015), after stripping off expected foreign exchange (forex) losses.
“The operation has started to show positive results, with promising forward booking through its new capacity management and revenue strategy,” he said after launching the group’s flight to Auckland, New Zealand, via its existing Kuala Lumpur-Gold Coast, Australia, route.
“The biggest loss last year was from the Australian sector. But it has been profitable since three months ago,” he added.
According to him, 4QFY15 was a bumper quarter for AAX, and that the numbers improved, compared with the last three quarters.
For 9M2015, AAX’s revenue and net loss amounted to RM2.2 billion and RM561.8 million respectively.
Benyamin also said AAX will introduce another three new routes this year, one to Hawaii and two to China, aside from increasing the frequency of flights on routes that are doing well.
Over the last 12 months, AAX’s share price has fallen a cumulative 65.5% to its current level, giving it a market capitalisation of RM788.2 million.
(Note: The Edge Research's fundamental score reflects a company’s profitability and balance sheet strength, calculated based on historical numbers. The valuation score determines if a stock is attractively valued or not, also based on historical numbers. A score of 3 suggests strong fundamentals and attractive valuations.)