The chief executive Luis Gallego said that the British Airways owner IAG is not planning to raise billions of euros from shareholders, for extending them through the COVID crisis. He said to the newspaper that they do not see the necessity to do a rights issue and are not considering it. He also added that the company was talking through different options with banks. In May, IAG had announced plans to raise 825 million euros. This is from a convertible bond to bolster its balance sheet. The group launched a 2.75 billion euros, last year.
Gallego noted that even though the group had high debts, they also had strong liquidity of 10.2 billion euros. Adding to the newspaper he said that they have revolving credit facilities and they are analysing other ways of financing the group. Repaying the debts will be the group’s priority. The British airline easyJet Plc, earlier this month opted to raise $1.7 billion from shareholders. This is to recover from the pandemic. And also, declined a takeover approach from Wizz Air. While the newspaper asked about discussing a merger with executives at easyJet, Gallego stated that they talk to all airlines that can be interesting to them.
