Wellington International Airport Limited Analysis

Overview

Wellington International Airport Limited is one of New Zealand's three main airports, which caters for approximately 5 million passengers per year and 100,000 aircraft. In 1998 the Crown sold its shareholding, 66% to listed infrastructure company Infratil Limited and 34% to Wellington City Council, a specialist investor in infrastructure and utility assets.

Infratil is listed on the NZX and owns airports in New Zealand and Europe, as well as electricity; waste to energy; and port investments in New Zealand and Australia. Since Infratil became a shareholder the Airport Company has invested over $250 million in its facilities.

On 2 December 2008, Wellington International Airport was listed on the NZDX following an initial offering for $50 million fixed rate bonds with the ability to accept over subscriptions of up to $50 million. As at 22 December 2008, $50 million unsecured unsubordinated five year, fixed rate bonds were fully subscribed. The top three bondholders include FNZ Custodians (11.71%), TSB Bank (9.2%) and Westpac Institutional Bank (5.52%).

WIA derives its revenue through three different streams: passenger revenue, property revenue and aeronautical revenue. The investment statement indicates an upward graph trend in increasing revenue over the past 11 years from between $6-7m in 1997 to around $30m in 2008 in passenger and property revenue alone.

Performance

The following information was extracted from Wellington International Airport Limited's Half Year results, released on 23 October 2025:

Wellington Airport releases Hull Year results unaudited results to 30 September 2025 :

Wellington Airport has announced its unaudited results for the six months ended 30 September 2025 with revenue growth of just under 4% to $94.4 million and EBITDAF before subvention payment1 up 3.9% to $65.5 million from the same period last year.

International passenger numbers are up 6.7% from the same period last year, while domestic passenger numbers are down 4.7%. Total passenger numbers are down 3.1% to 2,520,103.

Wellington Airport chief executive Matt Clarke comments:

“Domestic travel has faced well known headwinds in recent times, including Air New Zealand’s fleet availability issues which are set to improve over the next year or two.

“Demand for international travel remains strong, helped by increased Qantas services.

“In the last six months we’ve made excellent progress in preparing for future growth and building a better airport to support passengers, airlines and the wider Wellington region.

“As part of this, we’ve commenced our long-awaited runway upgrades, added much needed parking capacity, constructed our new Airport Fire Station and transformed our terminal with a new multi-level venue ‘Good Day’ and our new Wētā Workshop sculpture Manu Muramura.”

Highlights from the last six months include:

• Runway safety upgrades well underway and due for completion in 2026.

• New 800 space carpark opened.

• Construction complete on new Airport Fire Station with operational transition underway.

• Scored 98 out of 100 and a five- star rating from GRESB in their global sustainability assessment.

• Wellington City Council agreement to sell land to enable Lyall Bay waterfront upgrade.

• Planning for southern seawall renewal complete and resource consent application lodged.