Portugal’s state owned airline TAP transported 10.7 million passengers in 2013, an impressive performance and a full 5% over 2012, as had been predicted by the airline’s delighted boss, Fernando Pinto.
The rise of 517,000 passengers was mainly due to a positive performance on the routes from Portugal to and from Africa and Venezuela.
Last December's performance saw an increase in the number of passengers of 8.3%, which gave a "strong contribution to the final result." In the last month of last year, the highlight in the accounts was increased traffic on the route from the mainland to the Azores and Madeira, which increased 12.2%.
TAP’s European routes added 433,000 passengers in the year which was "decisive for global growth."
Despite these excellent figures the government still has given no indication of when it is to sell the company. The 2012 sale fiasco, which saw the last minute rejection of Gérman Efromovich’s offer, remains the only attempt to sell the company which is on the Troika list of state assets to be sold.
Whether TAP will be sold complete to a new owner, or offered for sale to the public on Portugal’s stock market, has yet to be decided. In the interim, the value of TAP continues to rise.
