Ryanair has raised its profit guidance for the financial year as it announced a €49 million profit for the previous quarter.
Rising passenger numbers and falling oil prices have helped the Irish carrier increase full-year profit forecast from between €810m and €830m to a range of €840m to €850m.
However, it warned shareholders and analysts to "temper expectations" for full-year profits in 2015-16.
“These strong results confirm that our ‘Always Getting Better’ customer programme and our expanded business schedules, coupled with our substantial fare and cost advantage over competitor airlines is drawing millions of new customers to Ryanair,” said CEO Michael O’Leary.
Ryanair’s €49m third quarter net profit compared with a loss of €35 million for the last three months of 2013.
Traffic jumped by 14% to 21 million customers and average fares were up 2% to €40 as revenues increased by 17% to €1.13bn while costs fell 6%.
Ryanair commented on the recent bids by IAG for Aer Lingus, which it owns a 29 per cent stake in, and said “Since Ryanair has received no formal approach, or offer for our shares in Aer Lingus, we will not engage in any speculation about this proposal”.