Ryanair says it expects to cut the price of flights this winter to keep its planes filled as it released its latest financial statement.
Chief executive of the budget airline Michael O’Leary said keeping prices low and passenger numbers high over the winter will "set us up strongly for a very strong recovery".
He expects ticket prices should return to pre-Covid levels "if not better” by summer 2022.
It comes as Ryanair confirmed the number of passengers flying with the airline in the six months to the end of September more than doubled compared with a year earlier.
Bosses said 39.1 million passengers flew with the no-frills carrier during the period, compared with just 17.1 million previously.
The airline still slumped to an after-tax loss of €48million (£40.6 million) but this is significantly up from the €411million (£347 million) recorded for the same period in 2020.
It expects a loss of between €100million and €200million for the financial year that ends on March 31 - a downgrade from its July forecast of "somewhere between a small loss and breakeven".
Ryanair blamed fare discounting and higher fuel costs. The airline expects to return to profitability in the year ending March 2023.
Mr O'Leary said: "While sectors and traffic more than doubled, operating costs increased by just 63% to €2.2 billion (£1.86 billion), driven primarily by lower variable costs such as aircraft, airport and handling, route charges and fuel.
"Lower costs, coupled with rising load factors, led to a marked reduction in cost per passenger (ex-fuel) to €38(£32).
"We expect to see further improvements in costs as our new, lower-cost, more fuel-efficient aircraft deliver and EU countries (such as Ireland, Spain and Italy) roll out Covid recovery incentive schemes."
The airline has already seen a surge in bookings for the mid-term and Christmas breaks, Mr O’Leary confirmed, with the levels expected to remain high into next year.
But the airline predicts next year will still be challenging and "dependent on the continued rollout of vaccines and no adverse Covid-19 developments".
Mr O’Leary also revealed that the company is mulling a delisting from the London Stock Exchange (LSE) in the wake of Brexit.
"Trading on the London Stock Exchange as a percentage of overall trading volume in Ryanair's ordinary shares has reduced materially during 2021," he said.
"The migration away from the LSE is consistent with a general trend for trading in shares of EU corporates post-Brexit and is, potentially, more acute for Ryanair as a result of the longstanding prohibition on non-EU citizens purchasing Ryanair's ordinary shares being extended to UK nationals following Brexit.
"The board of Ryanair is now considering the merits of retaining the standard listing on the LSE.
“Ryanair has a primary listing on the regulated market of Euronext Dublin, which offers shareholders the highest standard of protection."
