Cathay Pacific traffic rises 9% in July as demand stays strong

HK Express passengers rose 10.4% as its load factor reached 79.6%.

Cathay Pacific and HK Express carried around 3.5 million passengers in July, up 9% from a year earlier, as passenger demand remained strong during the summer travel period, Cathay Group said.

The group said in a 19 August statement that Cathay Pacific carried 2.71 million passengers, a 9% increase from July 2025, whilst available seat kilometres (ASKs) rose 5%. Its passenger load factor increased 1.3 percentage points (pps) to 87.2%.

HK Express carried 757,348 passengers, up 10.4% year on year (YoY), whilst ASKs increased 8% and passenger load factor rose four pps to 79.6%.

For the first seven months (7M) of 2026, Cathay Pacific carried 18.72 million passengers, up 16.2% from the same period in 2025. HK Express carried 4.92 million passengers, a 9.9% increase.

Lavinia Lau, Chief Customer and Commercial Officer of Cathay Group, said passenger demand was supported by long-haul travel from students and people visiting friends and relatives in the first half of July, followed by regional leisure travel as the summer holiday period began.

Cathay Cargo carried 148,638 tonnes in July, up 6.1% YoY, whilst available freight tonne kilometres fell 0.1%. Its cargo load factor rose 0.9 pps to 59.2%.

Cargo carried in 7M increased 8.1% to 1.02 million tonnes. Lau said cargo demand remained resilient, with strong growth from Northeast Asia and Southeast Asia.

Semiconductor flows supported Cathay Expert, whilst Cathay Dangerous Goods was boosted by increased lithium battery shipments from Northeast Asia and the Greater Bay Area.

“Looking ahead, whilst we expect the summer holiday period will affect demand on certain routes, we anticipate that demand for technology shipments will remain robust,” she said.

Cathay Cargo will add freighter capacity to the Americas from August, whilst Air Hong Kong will add capacity on selected regional routes later this year.

Jet fuel prices increased in July following an escalation of tensions in the Middle East, after declining in the previous months.