Fitch Publishes Quarterly Airport Trend Data

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

Fitch Ratings has published a quarterly snapshot detailing volume trends for its rated airports in the United States. Going forward, Fitch will continue to make this data available on a quarterly basis on www.fitchratings.com.

Passenger traffic for Fitch's rated airports is up 1.3% for the first three quarters of 2012 compared to the same period in 2011. Airports serving larger metropolitan areas continue to perform better than smaller regional airports with San Francisco, LaGuardia and Miami experiencing meaningful increases in traffic. Growth for some airports has been above historical trends, and Fitch views this as more temporary and likely to revert back to a more sustainable rate of growth.

Regional airports, especially secondary airports serving major markets, continue to be on a declining trend. Secondary airports such as Manchester (New Hampshire), TF Green (Providence), Burbank (California) and Ontario (California) have been experiencing multiyear declines which continued in 2012. Integration of services between recent merging legacy carriers, such as United and Continental or Delta and Northwest, has not measurably affected traffic performance at their primary hub airports or focus cities such as Atlanta, Chicago, Denver, Detroit, Houston Intercontinental, Minneapolis, and Washington Dulles airports. Still, worst-performing airports in Fitch's portfolio include Memphis, Milwaukee, and Cincinnati, all of which experienced double-digit declines. Traffic declines at all three airports are results of corporate decisions by carriers to reduce service, particularly those to support connecting traffic.

For any questions regarding these data sets, please contact the analyst listed below.

Link to Airport Trend Data:

http://www.fitchratings.com/web_content/sectors/gipf/fitch_airport_data_feb2013.pdf

Additional information is available on www.fitchratings.com.

Applicable Criteria and Related Research:

--'Rating Criteria for Infrastructure and Project Finance', July 12, 2012.

Applicable Criteria and Related Research:

Rating Criteria for Infrastructure and Project Finance

http://www.fitchratings.com/creditdesk/reports/report_frame.cfm?rpt_id=682867

ALL FITCH CREDIT RATINGS ARE SUBJECT TO CERTAIN LIMITATIONS AND DISCLAIMERS. PLEASE READ THESE LIMITATIONS AND DISCLAIMERS BY FOLLOWING THIS LINK: HTTP://FITCHRATINGS.COM/UNDERSTANDINGCREDITRATINGS. IN ADDITION, RATING DEFINITIONS AND THE TERMS OF USE OF SUCH RATINGS ARE AVAILABLE ON THE AGENCY'S PUBLIC WEBSITE 'WWW.FITCHRATINGS.COM'. PUBLISHED RATINGS, CRITERIA AND METHODOLOGIES ARE AVAILABLE FROM THIS SITE AT ALL TIMES. FITCH'S CODE OF CONDUCT, CONFIDENTIALITY, CONFLICTS OF INTEREST, AFFILIATE FIREWALL, COMPLIANCE AND OTHER RELEVANT POLICIES AND PROCEDURES ARE ALSO AVAILABLE FROM THE 'CODE OF CONDUCT' SECTION OF THIS SITE.