SpiceJet skids 19% in two days as India suspends UK flights till Dec 31

Shares of SpiceJet slipped 10 per cent to hit an intra-day low of Rs 82.35 on the BSE in the early morning trade on Tuesday, falling 19 per cent in the past two trading days, after India suspended flights to and from the UK.

India has suspended all flights from the UK from Tuesday midnight (December 22) till December 31 to prevent the new aggressive strain of the novel coronavirus from entering the country. This may lead to lower traffic recovery.

With the travel ban, India joins 30 other countries in Europe, Asia, and South America, which have restricted travel from the island nation, the Business Standard reported.

Earlier this month, the low-cost airline had started to operate non-stop flights connecting Delhi and Mumbai with London. The Delhi-London flight and the Mumbai-London flight will operate under the air bubble agreement with the UK, it had noted.

SpiceJet had signed a Memorandum of Understandings ("MoU") for a codeshare and interline agreement with Emirates to enable its passengers enjoy wide and seamless connectivity through their extensive network across Europe, Africa, America, and the Middle East.

For the first half (April to September) of financial year 2019-20, SpiceJet had reported a net loss of Rs 706 crore, as against a loss of Rs 200 crore during the same period of the financial year 2018-19. Total revenue from operations declined 73 per cent to Rs 1,592 crore from Rs 5,851 crore.

SpiceJet has operated 30 long‐haul repatriation flights to and from London, Amsterdam, Toronto, Rome and Milan.

At 10:19 am, the stock was trading 8 per cent lower at Rs 84.20 on the BSE, as compared to a 0.06-per cent decline in the S&P BSE Sensex. A combined 15.3 million equity shares had changed hands on the counter on the NSE and BSE till the time of writing of this report.