Dubai Q1 air passenger traffic down 68%, jet cracks on the rise

London (Quantum Commodity Intelligence) - Dubai International Airport's first-quarter 2021 passenger traffic dropped 67.8% to 5.75 million compared to the same quarter a year ago, Dubai Airports said in a statement on Wednesday.

However, the comparison against Q1 2020 came in a period which was "largely unaffected" by the Covid-19 pandemic, noted the report.

'Whilst passenger numbers for the first quarter remained significantly below the monthly volumes we handled before March 2020, in the context of the current global situation they are very encouraging and reflect the consolidation phase in our business recovery,' Paul Griffiths, chief executive of Dubai Airports, said.

Out of the 5.75 million passengers in the first quarter, DXB handled more than two million of these in March, the operator said, indicating a slight recovery in traffic for March.

India, which is traditionally a strong market for the UAE, remained Dubai International's top destination country with traffic in the first quarter reaching 1.3 million – driven by top city destinations New Delhi and Mumbai.

It was followed by Pakistan, Bangladesh and Russia.

Air cargo volumes showed more resilience than passenger traffic during the pandemic, growing 3.2 per cent to 550,811 tons during the first three months of 2021, Dubai Airports said.

Jet fuel was the worst performing part of the barrel during 2020 as passenger traffic shuddered to a halt.

Jet regularly traded at discounts to crude but the airline fuel has been gradually recovering during 2021.

Jet cracks in Asia have risen by around 8% over the past two weeks, according to Quantum data.

The five-day rolling average FOB Singapore Q3 crack versus cash Brent was marked at $4.80/b on Tuesday versus $4.44/b two weeks earlier.

Meanwhile, the five-day rolling average for jet fuel CIF Northwest Europe was $6.19/b, up from $5.88/b two weeks prior.

Q3 jet cracks have also improved versus 10ppm diesel, narrowing from a $2/b discount to $1.34/b on a Singapore basis.