Izvor: N1 televizija, 25.Apr.2018, 11:29 (ažurirano 02.Apr.2020.)
Is Etihad air carrier leaving Serbia?
The prospect of the UAE-based Fly Etihad Airways stay in the strategic partnership with Serrbia's national air carrier looks gloomy according to an investigative media report, while Serbia’s President has said that Air Serbia would survive the eventual break up.
The Insajder (Insider), an independent production house, reported that the Arab company had already went out of all other partner firms in Europe due to high debts.
The report said that even if Etihad >> Pročitaj celu vest na sajtu N1 televizija << decided to leave and sell its 49 percent of the ownership for one Euro, it would not lose anything, while Serbia, the owner of the majority stake of the remaining 51 percent, would have problems.
Public in Serbia, according to the report, knows a little about the agreement between the state and Etihad signed in 2013, since only two out of 13 signed documents regarding the partnership have been made public, while the rest are declared a trade secret.
The report said that its investigation into available documents and gathered information justified the question whether the deal with Etihad was good for Serbia.
The country invested a non-refundable amount into the joint venture, while Etihad turned its 40 million Euros loan into 49 percent of the ownership.
On top of it, the Arab company earned 40 million Euros in three years of joint business. Air Serbia was earning a million Euros per year, while it was paying services up to an average of 10 million Euros per year to Etihad. The financial reports do no specify what the payments were for.
The report also says that if Etihad gets out, Air Serbia will be left without a single new jet in its fleet since none was bought in the last five years of the partnership.
According to the Insajder’s report, official data on Air Serbia financial results for 2014 showed the company did well with an income of 3.3 million Euros, while in 2014 it reached four million Euros. Two years later, in 2016, the income was 1.8 million Euros, while the data for the last year are expected in July.
However, those figures included 159.5 million Euros in three years in state subsides, without which it seemed that Air Serbia was actually producing losses. The 2017 financial report should be more accurate since the agreement did not envisage any state subsidy for that year.
