Qantas Airways Limited (QAN) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and welcome to the Financial Year '25 Qantas Group Investor and Analyst Briefing for the first half results. I'd like to begin by acknowledging the traditional custodians of the land on which we meet today, the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation and pay my respects to elders, past and present. My name is Filip Kidon, and I'm the Head of Investor Relations for the Qantas Group. I'd like to now pass over to Vanessa Hudson, our CEO, to take you through the results.

Thanks, Phil, and good morning, everyone. Thank you so much for joining us today as we have announced and talked through our first half 2025 results. I'm here joined by Rob, our Chief Financial Officer, who will help assist me as we talk through the presentation, but I'm also joined by our entire group leadership team. We have Steph Tully, the CEO of Jetstar; Markus Svensson, the CEO of Qantas Domestic; Cam Wallace, the CEO of Qantas International and Freight; Rachel Yangoyan, the CEO of Qantas Link; and Andrew Glance, the CEO of Loyalty. Danielle Keighery, the Chief Corporate Affairs and Communications Officer; Catriona Larritt, our Chief Customer and Digital Officer; Catherine Walsh, our People Officer; Andrew Monaghan, Chief Risk Officer; Fiona Messent, Chief Sustainability Officer; and Ben Jones, who is our Acting General Counsel. That's a list. Today's briefing will be in audio format only, and Rob and I will take you through several of the key slides from our investor materials that we lodged today, and then we'll open up to questions. Earlier this morning, we announced an underlying profit before tax of $1.39 billion for the first half financial year 2025. Underlying EPS was up $0.63, which is 21% year-on-year. Our performance today highlights 2 really important key things. One, there continues to be an incredibly strong appetite that Australians have for travel, both in premium sector but also low cost. And this also highlights the 2 ongoing benefits of our integrated portfolio, which includes both our premium and low-fare airlines and our world-leading loyalty program and our freight business. I want to begin with a few reflections. Our fleet renewal program is progressing well, and it is accelerating. Across the first half, we invested $1.4 billion on fleet and other projects. This included 16 aircraft joining the fleet. 11 were the next-generation aircraft, including A321LRs, A220s and A320neos. This fleet renewal will continue with 18 new aircraft across this financial year and 21 next year. Whilst this activity is driving some entry into service costs, we can see the benefits, I think you can say, particularly as we look at the Jetstar result today. We have not taken our eye off continuing to focus on our customers, and we have invested significant time and money in rebuilding our reputation and delivering to our customers. This has been supported by investments, and we have seen positive momentum across all of our customer metrics across all of our flying brands. Our Qantas Net Promoter Score lifted 13 points in the half and Jetstar lifted 9. Customer satisfaction improved for all of our segments, but there is still progress to be made, and we will never declare that the job is done as this focus needs to continue on an ongoing basis. This will include focusing on on-time performance, in-flight services, reward for frequent flyers and more seamless travel experiences. And today, we have announced the next phase of this journey with an investment to refresh 42 of our younger 737 fleet. We know that our people are the driving force behind our success. As we previously have disclosed, we provided a thank you payment to 27,000 employees in December of $1,000, and we continue to invest significant amounts of training for both current and future employees, including investments in pilot and engineering academies. It has been really encouraging to see that employee engagement has improved, but there is clearly and always more work to do. And finally, I would like to mention our dividend. As we previously stated, it was our intention as a management team to strike the right balance between investing in the business and delivering returns to shareholders. Over the last 2 years, we returned surplus capital to shareholders via buyback. But now being profitable, this has enabled us to continue to invest in our fleet, customers and people, and it is my pleasure today that we can announce that the Board has approved the payment of a base fully franked dividend of $250 million. That is the equivalent of $0.165 per share and a special dividend of $150 million that Rob will talk in more detail later. One of the key features of the result today is that I think that this demonstrates the value that exists across our integrated group portfolio. I will reflect on this through a group lens as we talk through each of the business results. Group domestic. Group Domestic saw strong underlying performance with EBIT of $916 million, up 12% versus the prior period and a margin of 17%. Strong demand across both of our brands supported a lift in RASK of 5%, and this was at the upper end of our guidance range, with seat factors improving across both Qantas and Jetstar. Our dual brand strategy enabled the group to continue to drive strong performance across all market segments, including business purpose, premium and low-fare leisure markets. And we can't talk about domestic without calling out the amazing performance of Jetstar. Steph and the team continue to deliver exceptional value to customers, allowing more Australians to travel for less with approximately 1 in 3 Jetstar fares under $100 this half. We know how important this is with ongoing cost of living pressures with over 10 million customers choosing to fly Jetstar this half, more than any time we've seen in our past. Pleasingly, Qantas Domestic also saw strong demand and the continued recovery of business purpose travel, contributing to yield mix benefits and also a strong RASK outcome. The half saw a ramp-up of our fleet renewal program with Jetstar reaching scale and Qantas Domestic commencing its fleet renewal journey. Rob will take you through some of the cost implications of this later. Group International. Group International inclusive of freight, saw positive underlying performance of EBIT up 5% to $497 million and an EBIT margin of 8%. Capacity for Group International increased by 16%. This included continued restoration of capacity and new growth from Jetstar. This growth from Jetstar is a great example of the EBIT benefits, which new fleet deliveries can unlock. Group International CASK moderated 7%, and this was at the lower end of our guidance range. We said Group International RASK would inflect in quarter 4, and we remain on track for that. In fact, some markets are seeing RASK turn positive earlier than expected. It was also pleasing to see our freight returns grow during this period, and net freight revenue rose more than 10%, reflecting improved freight demand and ongoing benefits of fleet transformation and simplification. And now Qantas Loyalty. Underlying EBIT for Qantas Loyalty was $255 million. Whilst this was below last year, this is due to the significant investment we have made in Classic Plus, our new airline redemption product. And though it is early days, the signs are very encouraging. Put simply, our data shows that Classic Plus redeemers are earning points at 2x the rate of non-redeemers. This talks to the activation of the flywheel. And it has seen underlying momentum and the business remains strong with active members increasing 11% year-on-year. I will now hand to Rob, who will take you through the group financial and fleet highlights.

Thanks, Vanessa, and good morning, everyone. Well, for our first half '25 group financial metrics, underlying profit before tax was $1.385 billion, up $140 million or 11% compared to the first half of '24. Statutory profit after tax was $923 million, up by $54 million compared to the first half '24. The statutory result included a $65 million increase in legal provisions related to the ground handling federal court case. And the group's operating margin as a result was 12.4%, up 0.3 points compared to the first half of '24. And this continues to represent one of the strongest margins across the industry, and we remain committed to the margin targets we've set for the business. On the balance sheet, for the half, operating cash flow was strong at $2.1 billion, up 55% on the prior period, and this includes the $100 million impact of settling the ACCC fine during this period. Net debt ended the half at $4.1 billion, lower than our target range of $4.7 billion to $5.8 billion for the full year, and this is mostly as a result of capital expenditure that will be weighted to the second half. We expect for the full year that net debt will be at or below the middle of the forecast net debt range. The half also saw $431 million of share buybacks completed during this period with 55 million shares purchased at an average price of $7.82 per share. Unit cost, excluding fuel, increased by 3.1%, and this was driven by a number of drivers, which I will explain as part of the group bridge on the next page. So if I move to the group profit bridge. On this particular slide, I'll step through, as I said, the drivers of our first half '24 to first half '25 underlying profit, which increased, as I said earlier, $140 million year-on-year. In the half, group capacity increased 10% and coupled with benefits from a moderation in oil prices, it saw $650 million in contributions during the period. This was partly offset by the decline in group RASK of 2.9% or $280 million, and this included the impact of Jetstar increasing its share in the group's capacity mix. Our transformation program targeting $400 million for the year successfully offset the CPI the business faced in the half. And depreciation and amortization increased $140 million, in line with guidance for the full year. The ramp-up in fleet renewals saw the business incur fleet-related EIS costs and inefficiencies, and these totaled $53 million for the period. This included $8 million in EIS costs, $20 million in one-off costs related to write-off of spare parts and engineering restructuring as well as $24 million in transitional inefficiencies resulting from the delay in A220 deliveries. The group also saw the impact of previously announced Same Job Same Pay legislation with costs commenced across the group with $22 million incurred in the half. And finally, as Vanessa mentioned earlier, our thank you payments to employees totaled $29 million in the half. Turning to our new fleet. We have previously provided information on the replacement benefits of new fleet. Today, we are providing further details on the expected annual EBITDA uplift when replacing existing aircraft with new fleet. As the slide shows, on a replacement basis, we expect up to $10 million EBITDA benefit on the Jetstar A21LRs, up to $9 million EBITDA benefit on the A220s and up to $5 million EBITDA benefit on the A321XLRs. These benefits are driven by a range of categories and the fuel efficiency component is included in our transformation targets. The new technology is not like-for-like. They are delivering incremental earnings for the business, a better experience for our customers and our people and helping to progress our sustainability targets. In addition to the benefits of the new fleet versus the aircraft they are replacing, the new fleet also provide growth opportunities in both the domestic and international markets. These benefits accrue over time as each fleet grows and builds to scale, cycling over EIS costs and the benefits of the new fleet can clearly be seen in the Jetstar results today. I'd now like to move to the financial framework and its application across the last 6 months. Our long-standing financial framework is core to maintaining our financial strength. By design, the financial framework settings are built to target structurally low financial leverage through the cycle, preserving strong liquidity settings and as a result, maintaining a strong investment-grade credit rating. The framework is also important in informing our capital allocation priorities. Capital expenditure guidance for this year is $3.8 billion to $3.9 billion, and next year is expected to grow to $4.1 billion to $4.3 billion as new fleet deliveries grow. And we are confident with the earnings growth opportunities of the new fleet as has been demonstrated with Jetstar in the first half. As Vanessa said earlier, it is great to confirm the Board has approved the payment of a base fully franked dividend of $250 million, equivalent to $0.165 per share. And subject to Board approval at each half, it is our intention to maintain this base dividend at $250 million fully franked. In addition, in recognition of the group having additional surplus capital, a special dividend of $150 million, equivalent to $0.099 per share has also been declared. This brings the total distributions in the half to $400 million in fully franked dividends. Before I move on, I also wanted to emphasize that disciplined capital allocation is not just about future capital. Whether it is a decision about aircraft, what routes to fly, which brand to fly or which aircraft type to fly or a portfolio level decision, we are focused on ensuring optimal capital allocation across the group. And where we do identify opportunities to recycle capital, we will actively look to do so. I'll now hand back to Vanessa, who will take us through the outlook.

Thanks, Rob. The group continues to see strong travel demand across the portfolio over the coming period. Our surveys continue to show travel spend remaining a priority and leisure and corporate intent to travel remaining strong. This gives us the confidence as we head into the second half of the year. In the second half, Qantas Group RASK is expected to increase relative to last year, made up of the following: The second half group domestic RASK is expected to increase between 3% to 5% versus the prior year. And the second half group international RASK is expected to be flat versus last year. Please note that the RASK guidance is inclusive of a higher capacity mix from Jetstar given its stronger relative growth rates. We see continued growth in freight with net freight revenue expected to increase between $10 million to $30 million in the second half. Fleet-related transitionary costs in the half will also see entry into service costs in line with the previous guidance that we have given of $30 million. And of this, $22 million will be in the second half. Qantas Link fleet inefficiencies will moderate with approximately $17 million expected in the second half. We expect this to moderate further in the following year. Qantas Loyalty remains on track to grow underlying earnings by approximately 10% in financial year '25 versus the prior year. Our investor slides provide further detail on specific line items, including fuel costs, depreciation, transformation and the impacts of Same Job Same Pay. We also have our latest capacity guidance on Slide 33 of the investor materials. And finally, in closing, we wanted to finish actually where we started. Earlier today, Rob and I were in our Melbourne hangar in front of 2 of our newest aircraft types, a Jetstar A320neo and a Qantas Link A220. With both brands now renewing their fleet, it's the start of an exciting new chapter and the future holds significant potential for growth. Our result demonstrates the power of our portfolio and the success of our dual brand strategy. We finished the period in a position of financial strength and our confidence in the future supports our decision to reinstate dividends for you, our shareholders. I wanted to end today by again thanking all of our people for their hard work and contribution. Simply, this result would not have been possible without you. So thank you for that. And we will now open to Q&A, and I will pass to Phil to moderate.

Happy with our first question, please.

Your first question comes from Andre Fromyhr from UBS.

I just wanted to actually talk about the fleet renewal and appreciate the level of detail you've shared in the pack today. One feature that I think we've seen in previous results and again in this one is just a slight delay in the expected timing of delivery. So wondering if you could talk about the trend that you're seeing in the supply of those aircraft? And maybe to what extent that gives you some CapEx relief, but then do you depend on those new aircraft to deliver your transformation benefits? And how does FX fit into the shifting of timing on those aircraft?

Yes. Thanks for that question, Andre. And I might make a few overarching reflections and then pass to Rob. We clearly want these aircraft as quickly as possible. And I think that today's result that was posted by Jetstar just shows how much benefit that we're getting across all of our different stakeholders from better business performance, better customer outcomes, better people outcomes. And I think that the growth in profitability that we've seen from Jetstar just shows how much these aircraft are going to step change our business. You do see that there has been a small delay. I would say small. It's a couple of months. And one thing that we are absolutely front-footed about is making sure that we are always talking to Airbus in terms of minimizing the impact on the Qantas Group. And I think that we actually have seen the Qantas Group have a lower degree of delay than perhaps others. And the one thing that I would also say is that we're also really well positioned to manage and flexibly manage in the face of delays. We own, as you know, in Qantas, the majority of our fleet, and we now do that in Jetstar. And so we've got incredible fleet flexibility and optionality. But we don't want to have to continually look at reprioritizing our fleet because of delays, as I said, because we want the aircraft as quickly as possible. But Rob will give you an overview on FX and CapEx.

Yes. Thanks, Andre. Thanks for the question. I think just on the specifics. So as we put in the presentation, there have been some minor delays with regards to the XLR and the Sunrise aircraft. But we, as Vanessa said, have a great relationship with Airbus, and we'll be working through those. The information flow is really good. I think with regards to your CapEx and any relief, our CapEx that we provided both for FY '25 and '26 is inclusive of the current information that we have. I think you can expect that, obviously, the way that the arrangement works with Airbus is we pay installments per se or PDP funds to Airbus, which are not only for aircraft that are going to be delivered very soon, but also for aircraft thereafter. So we don't see any change with the guidance. And you can expect that when we provide that guidance, it's inclusive of that information. With regards to transformation, you're right, the new fleet play an important role with regards to transformation. There's many advantages of the new fleet, but obviously, the fuel savings we get is included in the transformation. I think what I would say is our commitment to ensure that we cover CPI increases with transformation. Obviously, with more aircraft and more fuel efficiency, that's going to have an impact, but our commitment stands by that. And then lastly, on FX, I think a couple of things to reiterate. One is the financial framework is obviously calculated within Australian dollars. We buy aircraft in U.S. dollars. We do hedge that. But I think it's also important to note that when we buy aircraft, it's typically over an extended period whereby the exchange rate essentially is averaging out. So we do everything we can to ensure that, that is the case. But I think, again, going back to guidance, the guidance that we provide on CapEx is what you should be guided by.

Your next question comes from Jakob Cakarnis from Jarden Australia.

I just wanted to focus on the group domestic, if I could, please. It looked as though there was $53 million of ramp-up costs in the first half for Qantas Domestic specifically. If you strip that out, it actually looks like the domestic -- Qantas Domestic EBIT margin improved year-on-year versus the slides that are showing a 1 percentage point decline. I guess the focus from here is just on the yield expectation for the second half across the group, you've said up 3% to 5%. Just wondering if you could talk to the drivers of that, please. It looks as though load factors for Jetstar are closer to that 90% record level. And then you've got Qantas Domestic similarly getting up near where it's been historically. What are the expectations around the drivers for yield? Is some of that going to be SME, corporate travel? Is there anything in there included for government travel if we do get an election in the second half of your fiscal year? And then just some commentary on ancillary, maybe from Steph, please?

Yes, great. I think that they are questions that -- first of all, I'll pass to Markus to talk about the strong revenue environment that we're seeing in Qantas and then we'll go to Steph.

Yes. Thank you for the question. So just coming to what we see in the RASK growth for the second half, it's a bit like in the first half. It's going to be a mix of seat factor. We have a bit more to go in certain months as well as yield. And that yield mix will, to some extent, continue to be driven by the return of corporate travel, which is really pleasing to see in the first half. It's continued to come back since COVID, and we expect that to continue in the second half.

And just to add to that, the outlook does include the assumption that we do know that there will be an election sometime in the second half. So Steph, any comments from Jetstar?

Yes. Thanks, Jake, for the question. The -- I mean, as we said at the start, just the demand at the low fares end continues to be really strong. So we see Jetstar more than meeting its growth in terms of its performance. And we are making a concerted effort to keep our load factors high. I think it's the right thing for a low-cost carrier to do. So you'll see that continue into this half as well. So our RASK is obviously a result of that load factor as well as the underlying sort of yield performance. And it's worth also just pointing out in the second half of this year, you see have a perfect alignment of Easter, Anzac day school holidays, which means that we're expecting a real peak in April of leisure travel across Qantas and Jetstar. So all of those things are built into our second half forecast and give us confidence.

Any comments on ancillary?

Ancillary, sorry. Yes, ancillary continues to be an important part of the Jetstar mix. We've seen year-on-year improvement across domestic and international. We've got a pipeline of products in the mix, which means we think that will continue in proportion size to be a really important part of the Jetstar revenue mix.

Thanks, Steph. Next question.

Your next question comes from Owen Birrell from RBC.

I just wanted to ask a question around the -- I guess, the capital management framework. You've talked to sort of $400 million of essentially dividends this period, which is nicely comparable to the $400 million of buybacks that you announced in the previous period. So just to confirm, the $0.165 per share dividend, obviously, $250 million, should we just consider that as, I guess, the flat line base? Or should that gradually grow with the underlying earnings? And then just secondly, on the Special, was a Special chosen this time around because either the amount to -- the $150 million was too small for a buyback? Or is it just because you had the surplus franking credits to deploy? So just trying to get an understanding of whether how the surplus is going to be distributed going forward.

Thanks, Owen. I'll pass that to Rob.

Yes. No, great question. Thanks, Owen. So I think just to be clear, I think the $250 million base dividend that we announced today, that is -- we believe is going to be sustainable through the cycle. And so that decision will obviously be approved by the Board every 6 months, but that is our expectation is that it will continue, and it will continue in a fully franked way. We are in a taxpaying position now where we are generating franking credits. And so it gives us confidence to announce today the $250 million as language being base dividend. Whether or not that will increase in the future, that will be up to the Board, and we'll make that decision with regards to the -- what's happening with the operating cash flows. I think on the special, just to be really clear, in addition to the $250 million, we looked into the forecasted cash flows of the business and looked at the surplus capital. And we made a decision that we wanted to distribute another $150 million. And this time around, and we'll do this every 6 months, we looked into what the most efficient form of that distribution would be, whether that would be through buybacks or whether it would be through dividends. And at this point in time, again, based on the franking credits that were available, and we know they're much better in the hands of our shareholders, we made a decision to do that in a special dividend. But every 6 months, to the extent that we do have excess surplus capital above the $250 million, we will make a determination as to whether that means through dividends or whether that means through buybacks.

Just wondering if I could just squeeze in a second question, just around your fuel guidance. I noticed that it included a SAF component. I'm just wondering if you can give us a sense of, I guess, what proportion of your fuel mix at the moment is going to be SAF. And if you can give us a sense of, I guess, what the premium you're paying for that SAF fuel versus, I guess, the underlying jet fuel?

Yes. We're not going to break it out at this point. I think you would assume that the SAF is quite small as a proportion of the total fuel bill at this point in time. We expect that it will rise over time. Obviously, we've got that 2030 target of 10%. But -- and also in terms of the premium to jet fuel, we're not going to go into those specifics.

But maybe Fiona is here, she can talk about the coalition program that we actually have where we're mitigating quite a bit of that premium.

Sure, happy to. We -- this is the third year of our SAF coalition program where we partner with corporates across Australia to help mitigate that green premium from SAF. We've tripled that program this year in its third year. So it's showing that, that demand really is steady for this type of program, and we're looking forward to working towards more material deals over the next couple of years as we look to our longer-term offtakes and having corporate partners help us deliver on those.

Thanks Fiona. Next question, please.

Your next question comes from Anthony Moulder from Jefferies.

Strong revenue result in the half and obviously, a positive outlook for RASK guidance and particularly that RASK guidance for international given strong capacity growth of flat RASK for international. Should we expect a step-up in costs that you're expecting in the second half that would challenge that traditional first half, second half split of profitability, please?

Well, there is, obviously, as you say, seasonal impacts on profitability. But I will get Steph and Cam to talk about costs in the second half because as you know that we have flagged, Same Job Same Pay will be a feature of the Qantas International cost base. Cam, do you want to reflect?

Yes. So we had a small percentage of the uplift in costs in this half, and we expect more to come through next year. And we'll be actively managing that through our transformation programs. One of the big drivers will be obviously getting the fleet and the restoration of capacity back in the market, which is a big driver. But clearly looking at all revenue and cost transformation initiatives to make sure we offset that, and that's our medium- to long-term commitment to do so. So in terms of the revenue split year-on-year, that's now pretty consistent with what it has been historically.

Thanks Cam, Steph?

Yes, Anthony, we're seeing that sort of 65-35 return. But I will say that the RASK, we're definitely seeing that pivot. And you've got to look market by market. But for Jetstar, as an example, across Japan and Bali, we're already seeing that positive RASK environment, which is pretty critical for Jetstar. So I think we're definitely seeing that turnaround to positive RASK environment for international happen in this half. And for Jetstar, to be honest, our growth has meant our CASK has actually improved, and we will continue to be ruthlessly disciplined about our cost base.

One thing I'd add, just, Anthony, on RASK for international is it's obviously very specific per market. But what we are seeing is the top quartile of our performing markets being those ultra-long-haul point-to-point, which gives us deeper and greater confidence that, that differentiated strategy is a successful one for us, and it underpins the investment we've got not only in Sunrise, but in our 787-9 fleet. So we're confident about those markets and how they're performing, not only at our EBIT level, but also for the customer experience and the returns we're getting in the customers' reaction.

Thanks, Cam.

I might just add, Anthony, I might just add one other point, which is around fuel. So you might have noticed with the guidance that we've provided, whilst we are seeing Brent essentially normalize or not normalized, but similar levels as we go into the second half, the decline of the Australian dollar versus the U.S. dollar is obviously increasing our fuel price. So obviously, we hedge with regards to both fuel and FX, but that's just one other one I'd probably call out.

Thanks, Rob. Next question.

Your next question comes from Justin Barratt from CLSA.

Just noting, again, a really strong result for Jetstar. I appreciate the commentary and the outlook commentary that you provided around RASK for the second half. But I just wanted to understand a little bit more about how, I guess, the broader Qantas Group is benefiting from the dual brand strategy and more so from, I guess, a demand perspective, given the demand backdrop at the moment. Any commentary there would be fantastic.

Yes. That's a broad question, Justin, and I might make a few comments. I think it is a really, really important part of what we are seeing with our domestic dual brand strategy and the way in which Qantas is serving the premium and business purpose travel and Jetstar domestically is serving the low end of the market and that we will manage our capacity dynamically as we see demand evolve over time. And we are doing that increasingly in a coordinated way on international as well, where we spend a lot of time looking at how demand changes. A typical example is with the higher Aussie dollar that Hawaii is actually becoming a much higher cost for a Jetstar customer where it continues to be a really strong market for Qantas. So we see, as we've always said, our aircraft are dynamic, and we will deploy them through that lens in a dynamic way. And I think that we've become so much more sophisticated over the last decade in that it's now a core competency that I think exists in the group. But also, let's not forget about freight. Freight plays an incredibly important role in serving the group, both in terms of belly, but also being able to capitalize on what is a growing e-commerce market in Australia, and we're investing in that fleet. And then last but not least, Qantas Loyalty is absolutely a fundamental part now that connects all of our flying businesses, including Jetstar and creates what is individually a segment that drives enormous value. But when you step up from that, it is absolutely the integrated value and the way these businesses work together and collaborate to deliver for customers, to deliver capacity is a fundamental part of how we're managing the business and what you see in terms of the value that is being generated. I hope that answers the question, but I think that it's now core for us. Next question.

Your next question comes from Sam Seow from Citi.

Just a quick question on capacity. As we think about the new planes, a few retirements, perhaps a bit of underutilization as well. I just want to understand in Jetstar, how we should think about the sustainable kind of medium-term level of capacity growth you can achieve in that business? And then perhaps in a similar vein, as we think about Qantas Domestic, capacity is a bit flatter there, might even decline this year. Just what's been the underlying driver of that materially different growth rate?

Yes, great. So we'll start with Steph.

Yes. So I mean, we look at capacity as a group as per Vanessa's last answer across both international and domestic, and we will allocate our assets where we see the demand. So we will always try and understand the underlying demand by route, by segment and then allocate capacity accordingly. And what we've seen is tremendous demand at the low fares end of the market and Jetstar meeting that with the growth that you've seen. And we can balance as a group, fleet retirements. And obviously, we've got new fleet coming in to meet that demand, but also as we have more fleet commonality moving forward between Qantas and Jetstar, we can also move our assets to where we see that demand, both in New Zealand, Australia, offshore and here. And it's really important part of our strategy that as we've had fleet get older, we can also send them to Qantas in the West where utilization, to your question on utilization is not as high as what Jetstar needs out of domestic. So we've got this very sort of broad group view of how we use our assets and capacity. So we will continue every -- and we do this day in, day out to look at the underlying demand settings and really look at where we use the brands across that demand to match that supply with the demand, so we can optimize our settings.

We might actually start with Rachel because what we know about the new technologies coming and what we know about our customers is they want to be served more point to point. And the 220 is an amazing vehicle that is enabling us to do more of that on Mainland Australia. So Rachel, do you want to talk a little bit about capacity and how you're thinking about deploying those aircraft?

Yes. Thanks. Look, we are super excited to have the 5 A220s that we have. We can't wait to have more. We are seeing some fantastic proof points of this aircraft. Our customers love that. We see it in the advocacy scores, and we are really seeing the fuel benefits come through when we compare that to the 717. As you can see today, we've also talked about what we see as the benefits on a like-for-like replacement of the 717 when we're at scale. And that really comes from the operating advantages of these aircraft that we get through fuel and operating costs, but also the additional seats and the utilization that we can get. These aircraft can connect any 2 points in Australia. They give us great opportunities to look at new markets, but also add capacity or frequency into time zones or time channels that allow us to provide a really great proposition for our key corporate customers as well. So we're excited about them. We note, yes, there has been some inefficiencies as we bring those in, but they are temporary and transitionary and as we see scale, and we're confident by this time next year, we'll be at a point where we'll be seeing some of that come through, and we look forward to it.

Thanks. and Markus, any comment on trunk?

There's not much to add. But just one thing I just want to highlight what Steph said as well. I think we are very -- and Vanessa mentioned, we are very sophisticated of moving capacity based on demand between the brands, but also between -- even within the brands with Qantas between domestic and international to make sure we're optimizing the financial return. So I just want to stress that point. In terms of where we're seeing demand just on Trunk, as we mentioned, the corporate -- return of corporate travel continues, and we've seen our performance in the trunk route has been very, very strong this half, and we hope and we will see it continue into the second half.

Thanks, Markus. Next question, please.

Your next question comes from Cameron McDonald from E&P.

Can I ask -- well, I'll sneak in 2 questions or I'll have it as 1 question in 2 parts. The -- just in terms of how you sized the $250 million base dividend, please? Like what did you consider as part of that sustainable base? Was it more around the domestic performance and/or the loyalty performance in a domestic context going forward? And just trying to work out how you're thinking about that sizing. And then secondly, just wanted a quick update on where you're seeing the revenue intakes at the moment, in particular, a split between domestic -- sorry, premium and economy relative to where you were last year, please?

We might take the intake question first because I'll maybe throw to Cam on what he's seeing there on international intakes and we'll move around the CEOs.

Yes. So both our RASK and our load factor and our intakes continue to perform particularly well in our premium cabins. Now our premium cabins are a different mix based on the aircraft type. So obviously, we've got first-class premium and business class. So we're seeing good early demand and also underlying strength. So those premium cabins continue to perform really well for us, and we continue to be confident about the outlook about how they will build into the peak seasons.

Markus, just on domestic in total.

Yes. I mean we don't differentiate between business and economy in the same way, but we talk about premium demand, we talk about corporate demand, SME demand and even premium leisure, and we can add to that, that we are seeing it being very strong. We're seeing it coming back in terms of corporate travel. So, yes.

Great. and Steph?

Nothing much to add. It's very strong on the low fares end. And as I said earlier, just the holiday configuration in this half is a real added bonus.

And on the dividend?

Yes. Now let me answer the first part of your question. So I think the first thing to say is we'll always be guided by the financial framework. That's the bedrock of the way we make these decisions. It's always done at a group level. So you called out, Cam, some of the individual business units and growth earnings potential going forward. And they're all part of the group FFO forecast. So whether it's around the incremental profits we expect from new fleet, whether it's the growth we expect from loyalty, but this is all giving us confidence about the earning growth from the business. So the financial framework then considers what are we doing with CapEx and what are we doing with shareholder distribution. And I think it's really important, and we said this for a number of years, that we want to make sure we're striking the right balance between investing in our business and returning our distributions back to shareholders. So that is how we size our confidence in the base dividend at $250 million. We obviously also looked at the implied dividend yield that, that would be in the market, and we're very comfortable with where that sits and think it's quite competitive.

Great, thank you. Next question.

Your next question comes from Ian Myles from Macquarie.

Just a simple one. We're seeing more competition coming into some of the international. It may not affect second half '25. Just sort of what you're seeing in that sort of 6-month outlook of all the additional seats in the European markets?

I might get Cam to...

Yes. Thanks for that question. And the first thing I'd say is, look, we really embrace competition and we think it makes us better. It's better for the market and better for our customers, and it drives us to perform better. So we've got 52 competitors on the international network. So we're very comfortable with competition. In terms of the type of competition that we're seeing, if you look at the incremental number of seats going into the market, the kind of 2 markets that are absorbing the majority of that capacity are one, Africa, which is our incremental capacity with largely the A380 going into that market. And then second, Europe. Now a lot of that's Qatar, but also it's Turkish as well and a bit of [ heaty hard ]. It's a combination of those 3 carriers. The characteristic of those 3 carriers is that they are super connectors. So we don't compete directly with them. We don't have any of our equipment flying over the Middle East. We've got a differentiated product, both on a nonstop basis through Perth, also our future strategy, which is Sunrise, but also a really strong service over Singapore with a much loved aircraft, the A380. So at this stage, it's probably too early to access any impact. We haven't seen any material impact, and we've seen the pricing be what we consider to be pretty standard, but the challenge and opportunity for us is differentiating our product and service over the medium term. And I think the capacity adjustments for next year on Europe is about 3.4% of market capacity. So we think the underlying demand is there to remain confident in the outlook.

Thanks Cam. Next question, please.

Your next question comes from Matt Ryan from Barrenjoey.

I had a question on loyalty. I was just curious on how the Classic Plus program progressed over the period. And as part of that, just to sort of reconcile the numbers that you've given to us. So I think you told us that a bit more than 22 billion points were redeemed on that program. How do we reconcile that into the change in the total points redeemed, which looks like it was up about 5 [ million ] year-on-year?

I will get Andrew to answer that.

Yes, great question. Look, Classic Plus is performing extremely well. I think to your point, we've seen around 22 billion points redeemed on Classic Plus to date. And in actual fact, from a total flight redemptions perspective, we've had our best month ever in January. So certainly proving to be a very important part of that sort of overarching integrated value that we talk to. I think with regards to total redemptions, a really important point to note to that is that Classic Plus was a significant investment to essentially address, again, one of the biggest pain points that we as a program, we're experiencing that being availability. An important part of the program remains in Classic Flight Rewards, of which is also a very important proposition, and we're seeing around 13,000 seats a day redeemed on that product. So overall, the portfolio is performing very well. In terms of confidence, I mean, if anything, this probably gives me even greater confidence with regards to these targets. Classic Plus again, is at the core of our travel redemption proposition. And with the weight of the program more broadly in terms of, again, partnering with both Qantas and Jetstar and importantly, our alliances more broadly, we are really reinforcing the value that we as a program can generate across not only travel, financial services and retail more broadly. So from my perspective, it's a very pleasing start. And I think just with regards to, I suppose, the flywheel more broadly, we are starting to see some really positive signs to Vanessa's point on that. Encouragingly, we are seeing 2x the growth rate for those that have redeemed on Classic Plus to date for those that have not. So it is reengaging in that flywheel and people are coming back to effectively accelerate that earn. So if anything, this should give you more confidence in terms of the numbers.

Next question, please.

Your next question comes from Billy Boulton from Morgans.

Just on Loyalty, your guidance implies some very strong growth in the second half. Can you just then talk about how we should think about that growth profile into FY '26?

Look, I think if anything.

Just broadly.

Yes. So if you think of it in terms of the overarching -- so actually, if you think of '26 and even beyond, it's a relatively easy equation with regards to the math in terms of where we're essentially aiming to get. We very much hold true to the targets as previously communicated. There are 3 or 4 things that effectively make this program as successful as it is today. Number one, it's the number of members. We've just ticked over 17 million, which is fantastic. The more important number in that are those members that are engaged. We've seen that increase 11% on the half, which really reinforces the engagement and value that we as a program generate. A lot of that is then fed through the product range and depth and value more broadly that ultimately drive both earn and burn. In a nutshell, if we target to basically reengage or engage across program 3% to 4% year-on-year and effectively drive the earn and burn 7% to 8%, respectively, then ultimately, we are delivering against that sort of 10% range, so to speak. So overall, the underlying drivers are extremely strong. And again, confidence in those targets should be very much embedded.

Thanks, Andrew. Next question.

Your next question comes from Nicole Penny from Rimore Equity Research.

Apologies if you have answered this question before earlier in the call. But the announcement of the dividend suggests that management considers this portion of free cash flow as surplus to operational and investment needs at this stage. Is this a fair interpretation of where you see Qantas in the cycle?

I think you're asking a similar question, but just to reiterate what I said earlier, I think the $250 million of base dividend that we've announced, we believe that is sustainable through the cycle. We've obviously been governed by the financial framework here. And so our expectation is that we will continue on a fully franked basis.

And I think it's the final question.

Your final question comes from Owen Birrell from RBC.

I appreciate the opportunity to ask a follow up. I just wanted to ask, I guess, a more broad question first. We've seen a lot of the other travel names reporting this reporting season talking to a much stronger skew to the second half in terms of earnings. I just wanted to get a sense as to what you guys are thinking in terms of the seasonality of your earnings this year. Are you thinking that this should be in line with historic first half, second half SKUs? Or are we looking at a stronger second half?

Do you want to take that?

Yes. No, good question. I think we have a statement in the outlook statement to sort of reinforce that. From a P&L perspective, we do expect that it will be in line with historical trends, i.e., majority in the first half. And I think from a cash perspective, that is typically weighted to the second half, and that's because of the way with airline [ Ria ], it's mostly into the second half. So that would be consistent with what we've seen before.

Okay. I think we might have one more question.

We have a question from Niraj Shah from Goldman Sachs.

Thanks for all the detail on the fleet renewal and the new aircraft. I just wanted to learn a little bit more on the existing fleet renewal. Should we assume that at the end of the program, there's sort of no change in number of seats or premium mix? Or will that adjust slightly as a result of the refresh?

Let me see if I've understood the question. Based on the forward outlook, we are seeing that there will be growth across the flying businesses basically in line with what we see demand. And we will manage that through the different mix of the aircraft that we have for domestically with Qantas and also Jetstar. And that, as I said before, we've got flexibility to meet that capacity growth as we see it every period because we're getting new fleet and because we are also -- we've got the opportunity to delay retirements if we need to because that's a key part of the flexibility in the fleet. And also the new fleet that are coming have more seats. So I think that it's going to be a constant optimizing approach that we take. We are reconfiguring the 737, 330s and 787s. So our Jetstar 787s are seeing an increase in premium. The reconfiguration of the 737s and the A330s is relatively in line with the same seats that we've got today. And when you actually look to Qantas International, we've said before that Sunrise will be 100% growth. And then obviously, with the A380s coming back, that gives us the ability to continue to grow in line with the market. And I think that, that's an important point. We obviously are very focused on making sure that we continue to serve those customers, but grow in line with demand as we see it. And the flexibility that we have with our fleet, reconfigurations and new fleet, but also owned aircraft gives us that optionality. Thank you. I think that that's it. Thank you so much, everyone, for joining us online, and thanks, everyone, in the room. Looking forward to seeing you over the coming weeks.