Air France-KLM posted a 20.5 percent drop in fiscal first-quarter sales on Thursday as the continuing deterioration in the economic climate hurt demand for air travel and air freight.
Revenue totalled EUR5.19 billion euros in the three months to June 30, Europe's biggest airline said in a statement.
Sales in the carrier's passenger business fell 18.7 percent to EUR4.01 billion on the back of a 4.7 percent reduction in capacity, a 5.8 percent drop in traffic and a 14.5 percent decline in yields, the airline said.
Cargo revenue dropped 41.5 percent to EUR544 million due to a decline in traffic of 22.7 percent, a 17.2 percent cut in capacity and a 25.1 percent fall in yields.
"We maintain our assumption of a more limited deterioration in the second quarter and stability in the last two quarters, with even a slight improvement at the end of the year compared with the second half 2008-09, itself already impacted by the crisis," Air France-KLM said.
The airline said the trend of the first three months of 2009 had continued in the fiscal first quarter.