Panama-based Copa Holdings SA, the parent company of Copa Airlines and Aero Republica, said Thursday its first-quarter profit fell 19 percent on a jump in fuel prices.
Copa earned $39.5 million, or 91 cents per share, compared with $48.6 million, or $1.12 per share, for the same quarter in 2007.
Operating revenue rose 22 percent to $295.9 million from $242.7 million in the year-ago period.
Analysts polled by Thomson Financial expected a profit of 89 cents per share on $295.4 million in revenue.
Copa said the recent quarter's results included $21.7 million in additional fuel costs resulting from a 35 percent jump in the all-in average price per gallon of jet fuel.
The company flew a total of 1.62 billion revenue passenger miles during the recent quarter, up 13.5 percent from 1.43 billion in the same period of 2007. A revenue passenger mile equals one paying passenger flown one mile.
Capacity rose to 2.08 billion available seat miles from 1.87 billion in the year-ago quarter. Occupancy, or load factor, increased 1.6 percentage points to 78 percent.
Copa shares were unchanged at $38.03 in early trading.
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