Air Baltic generated a €202 million ($242 million) operating loss in 2020 amid the pandemic, swinging from a €27 million EBIT profit in the previous year. Revenue at the Latvian carrier declined 72% to €143 million, as the number of passengers dropped to 1.34 million from 5 million in 2019. The airline's net loss increased 29-fold from €9 million in 2019 to €265 million, Air Baltic has disclosed. Chief executive Martin Gauss acknowledges: "We saw a dramatic change last year." But he insists the airline's "core vision" of serving Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia as the region's primary airline "remains the same". The Latvian state has a 96% shareholding in the Riga-based carrier, with the remainder held by Danish businessman Lars Thuesen through his fully owned company Aircraft Leasing 1 SIA. In order to reduce losses, Air Baltic in 2020 decommissioned its Boeing 737s and De Havilland Canada Dash 8-400 turboprops two years ahead of a plan to become an all-Airbus A220-300 operator, and updated its business strategy now dubbed "Destination 2025 CLEAN". Air Baltic says that the measures helped it to significantly reduce costs. The airline's staff declined 30%, to around 1,200 at the end of 2020. Supported by cargo and repatriation flights, the carrier operated around 22,000 flights in 2020, down 64% from the previous year. Still, Air Baltic says it served a total 76 routes from Riga, Tallinn and Vilnius – 12 less than in 2019. Gauss believes there are "some positive signals" that begin to show increased travel demand. "We have developed several scenarios for the gradual market recovery. Our base scenario reduction is currently in line with the industry wide projections," he states. But he adds: "We are flexible to make further adjustments whenever necessary." Data shows that Air Baltic has 25 A220-300s, four of which are listed as being in storage, alongside 12 Dash 8-400s. In November, Air Baltic appointed Jetcraft Commercial to sub-lease 11 of the turboprops. The airline has 25 A220-300s on order, and options and letters of intent on an additional 30 of the type. Seven more A220s will join its fleet this year following an agreement with Airbus in 2020 to push back deliveries, Air Baltic previously said. The airline had signalled that it would have all 50 A220s in service by 2023, but this has been delayed until 2024.

Avianca is planning to raise $1.8 billion of exit financing ahead of its anticipated emergence from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection later this year. The Colombian carrier says in a regulatory filing that it plans to raise $1.8 billion of debt and equity to refinance $1.4 billion of Tranche B debtor-in-possession (DIP) financing obligations, and to provide $400 million of incremental liquidity to meet its target of $1 billion of exit liquidity. "Prior to initiating a competitive process to determine the availability of more attractive equity funding, Avianca is working to negotiate the final terms and conditions for its option to convert $902 million Tranche B DIP obligations into equity," states the airline. "The terms of the exit financing will be determined through mutual agreements between Avianca and the parties whose terms best meet the objectives of the company." The financing will also be subject to approval from the US Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, which is overseeing Avianca's Chapter 11 process. The carrier points out that, at this stage, it is not possible to know the full extent of its liabilities, or whether third parties, creditors or shareholders will contribute new capital. It also remains uncertain whether the value of Avianca's shares will be diluted, or if the company will be liquidated. "As a result of the foregoing, under the Chapter 11 plan, the shareholders of the company may be diluted, or the value of their shares reduced to zero, due to the decrease in equity of the company attributable to the companies' liabilities to third parties or creditors, as well as the injection of capital by new investors pursuant to the Chapter 11 plan," says Avianca.
The airline notes that it is "well along" in its fleet simplification and cost-reduction programme, which it expects will result in a reduction of more than $2 billion in aircraft debt and leasing obligations during the period from March 2020 to 31 December 2022. It expects its leverage measured as net debt to adjusted EBITBA to drop from 5.8x as of 31 December 2019 to below 3x by the end of 2023. Avianca has retained Seabury Securities as financial and restructuring advisor to raise its exit financing.

Swiss will roll out IATA's Travel Pass on its Zurich-London Heathrow route from 22 April, becoming the first Lufthansa Group carrier to employ the mobile app aimed at easing travel amid the pandemic. Travellers can opt to receive their Covid-19 test results directly into the app to display their travel eligibility to airlines and other relevant authorities without divulging other personal health information, Swiss says. It also enables travellers to check Covid-19-related entry provisions at their country of destination. Swiss is additionally testing other digital solutions, including the EU Green Pass and CommonPass, and trialling a programme under which travellers can upload Covid-19 test results on the carrier’s website up to 12 hours before the trip, to check their eligibility to travel. That programme is currently tested on its flights to Spain, Portugal and US city Newark from Zurich.