KUALA LUMPUR: Capital A Bhd is believed to be seeking a valuation of some RM5 billion for its planned sale of its aviation unit AirAsia Bhd that will eventually be merged with AirAsia X Bhd to be under AirAsia Aviation Group Ltd (AAGL).
A local financial portal quoted sources saying that the valuation was a 12 per cent discount to Capital A's market value of RM5.7 billion as at end-2019.
However, it was a 61 per cent premium to the company's market capitalisation of RM3.1 billion as at Jan 18.
On Jan 8, Capital A announced that it had entered into a non-binding letter of offer with AirAsia X to sell its aviation business to the latter.
The sale is part of the company's strategic move to streamline the group and raise capital.
AAGL consists of AirAsia subsidiaries in Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines and Cambodia.
In a statement recently, Capital A said its airline arm AAGL was back back painting the town red with 162 aircraft operating in its fleet of 216 planes and some 57 million passengers carried from January to December 2023.
The operational capacity and passenger carried represents 74 per cent and 77 per cent recovery from pre-Covid levels.
The group - consisting of AirAsia Malaysia, AirAsia Thailand, AirAsia Indonesia and AirAsia Philippines - also recorded a robust load factor of 88 per cent for 2023.
"This achievement signifies the return of strong travel demand, which was aligned to the group's relentless effort in injecting capacity back into the market and reinstating the route network," Capital A said in a statement recently.
Capital's A's digital unit, airasia MOVE, had maintained an average of 15 million monthly active users in 2023, a 42 per cent increase from 2022.
The increased number of users led to a 32.5 million number of transactions for the year, reflecting a 75 per cent growth from 2022.
The company's digital financial services arm, BigPay saw a 14 per cent increase year-on-year to some 1.5 million annual carded users and a gross transaction value growth of 28 per cent compared to 2022.
BigPay's remittance activity grew by 86 per cent in 2023 driven by domestic and international transactions while loan disbursement grew by 159 per cent due to the utilisation of alternative data in credit scoring method to identify low risk segments within its loan application pool.
Teleport, Capital A's logistics arm, has seen its total tonnage moved for the cargo segment at 200,000 in 2023 an 88 per cent increase from the previous year.
The company said the utilisation rate in 2023 saw an uptick at 14 per cent due to the expanded capacity during the year from the return of international flights, the induction of Teleport's first two dedicated Airbus A321 freighter aircraft and collaborating with third-party airlines.
Capital A's maintenance, repair and overhaul service provider, Asia Digital Engineering had completed 50 per cent more base maintenance checks in 2023 compared to 2022.
Its overall full-year performance for line maintenance saw a significant 92 per cent surge in the number of checks in 2023 compared to the prior year.
Santan, the group's in-flight service provider, saw its sale increased by 114 per cent in 2023 with 19.6 million units sold.
The sale is led by 19.1 million perishable and non-perishable food and beverages sold onboard its flights while 500,000 units of duty-free and merchandise products were sold in 2023.
Capital A's ground handling unit, Ground Team Red, handled 144,000 flights for the whole of 2023 with over 22 million passengers and over 86,000 tonnes of cargo handled in 2023.