by This week, Swiss Rail published its half-year results. During the first six months of 2024, the company made a profit of CHF 50.8 million, a level far below what is required for it to operate comfortably and service its debt. Swiss Rail © Sergiomonti | Dreamstime.comAs a rule of thumb, to remain in good financial shape the company needs to make a profit CHF 500 million annually, which would mean CHF 250 million over six months, roughly five times the recent six month result. The main areas of difficulty faced by the rail operator are the poor performance of its freight division and the high costs of maintaining regional networks. Freight transport recorded a loss of CHF -42.6 million, significantly below the CHF -18.0 million recorded durning the first six months of 2023. A
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This week, Swiss Rail published its half-year results. During the first six months of 2024, the company made a profit of CHF 50.8 million, a level far below what is required for it to operate comfortably and service its debt.
As a rule of thumb, to remain in good financial shape the company needs to make a profit CHF 500 million annually, which would mean CHF 250 million over six months, roughly five times the recent six month result.
The main areas of difficulty faced by the rail operator are the poor performance of its freight division and the high costs of maintaining regional networks.
Freight transport recorded a loss of CHF -42.6 million, significantly below the CHF -18.0 million recorded durning the first six months of 2023. A downturn in the construction industry, the weak economic situation in Germany and Italy, and restrictions in the Gotthard Base Tunnel reduced the amount of freight moving across the Swiss Rail network, reported the company.
Despite higher passenger numbers, which rose 0.7% to 1.34 million passengers a day, profits from regional networks fell from CHF 18.3 million to CHF -5.9 million. This was mainly due to increased costs, in particular the scheduled maintenance services for rolling stock, which fluctuate in individual years due to the maintenance cycles.
Train networks and rolling stock are costly to maintain and generally require significant public money to keep them moving. The economic argument for public subsidies is that getting Switzerland’s highly productive workforce to work on time is worth the investment.
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