Turkish Airlines has indicated a shift of Airbus A321neo deliveries into 2020 in the company's half-year financial briefing.

The carrier had been expecting a year-end fleet of 17 A321neos when it revealed its first-quarter performance.

But an update covering the six months to 30 June shows that this has been trimmed to 15.

Turkish Airlines, which has seven A321neos in its fleet, was intending to take 15 A321neos during 2019 but the revision shows it will receive 13 this year, while the planned 2020 intake has risen from 22 to 24.

The carrier has not specifically indicated the reason for the shift, although Airbus has been trying to cope with delays to A321neo deliveries owing to industrial challenges.

Turkish Airlines is forecasting a year-end fleet of 239 single-aisle aircraft – it has retained in this forecast an expectation of having 24 737 Max jets by the end of 2019, despite a grounding of the type which has halted deliveries.

Over the first half of the year Turkish Airlines suffered a consolidated net loss of $203 million, on revenues of $5.9 billion, in contrast to the previous interim net profit of $41 million.

SunExpress, its joint-venture carrier with Lufthansa, turned in a net loss of $28 million, slightly worse than the prior $25 million deficit.

Source: FlightGlobal.com