Dart Group made an operating profit of £204.9 million for the six-month period to September 30, as revenue rose by 34% from £1.24 billion to £1.66 billion despite a “challenging season in terms of pricing”.

Jet2.com opened new bases at Stansted and Birmingham in summer 2017 which helped the airline to increase passenger numbers by 41% to 7.14 million for the half-year while maintaining a load factor of 93.2% that was similar to the same period in 2016.

But Jet2.com’s average ticket yield per passenger fell by 17% from £91.88 to £75.95 year-on-year on the back of the 41% rise in seat capacity. Although, the average price of a Jet2holidays’ package went up by 2% to £645 year-on-year.

Philip Meeson, Dart Group’s executive chairman, said: “Leisure travel customer volumes were strong during summer 2017 and since the half-year end, we have seen a further strengthening of customer demand, particularly for our flight-only product. 

“This has resulted in future leisure travel bookings for this financial year performing ahead of expectations.”

Meeson added that the company’s board was “optimistic” that its profit for the current financial year, ending on March 31, 2018, would “materially exceed” previous market expectations.

This helped to send Dart’s shares up by around 10% to £6.60 on the London Stock Exchange following the announcement of the results.

But Meeson warned that Dart was set to experience “increased losses” over the winter 2017-18 season as the company continued to “invest in additional aircraft, advertising and people in readiness for further flying programme expansion at all our operating bases in the summer 2018 season”.