Ryanair Holdings PLC (LSE:RYA) reported stronger passenger numbers for last month than expected, enabling it to become the first European airline to carry over 200 million passengers in a year.
March traffic saw roughly 15 million passengers flown, with a load factor of 93% across more than 84,000 flights.
This meant for the year to March 2025, the Irish budget airline flew 200.2 million passengers at a 94% load factor.
"This accomplishment is notable, especially considering that Easter 2025 falls entirely in April 2025," said broker Peel Hunt, which added that March traffic was higher than its forecasts of 14.4 million passengers.
"While we view this positively, we suspect some yield stimulation was required," the broker said, adding that it sees Ryanair's stock as "discounting a lot of positive news relative to other airlines".
Shares in the airline were down 0.55% at €18.89 on Wednesday morning.