Emirates' annual profits hit $5.7b despite conflict disruption

Emirates Group announced a 3.0 per cent rise in annual profits to $5.7 billion on Thursday despite severe disruption from the Middle East war, with flights grounded and Dubai airport repeatedly targeted.

The state-owned entity that includes Emirates, the world's biggest long-haul carrier, reported record pre-tax profits of $6.6 billion and record cash assets of $16.2 billion.

March, the last month of the financial year when Iran launched daily strikes at its wealthy Gulf neighbours, was "disruptive and challenging", it said.

"For the first 11 months of 2025-26, the picture across the Group was very positive," chairman and CEO Sheikh Ahmed Bin Saeed Al Maktoum said.

"Although we are still operating at a lower passenger capacity than pre-disruption, cargo operations have ramped up to support the movement of essential goods into and through the UAE," he added.

"On 28 February, military activity massively disrupted global commercial air traffic in the Gulf region, including in the UAE," the annual report said.

Using safe corridors, flights resumed on March 2 and Emirates was flying 58 per cent of its passenger capacity to 122 destinations by the end of the month.

Passenger numbers slipped one per cent to 53.2 million over the financial year, Emirates said. The group paid a dividend of $1 billion to its owner, the Investment Corporation of Dubai.

"We hope for a clear resolution to the hostilities soon, and a return to market stability. But in the meantime, we are not sitting on our hands," Sheikh Ahmed said.

He said Emirates was "well-hedged" on fuel costs until 2028-2029, providing protection from the surge in oil prices triggered by the war.

"We have worked with our suppliers to secure the volumes required to support our current operations and our scaling-up to pre-disruption levels," the Emirates chief said.

Agence France-Presse