CÉSAR URRUTIA MADRID

MADRID

Updated Tuesday, March 12, 2024-1:00 p.m.

The liberalization of high speed and the phenomenon it has meant for millions of travelers who use this mode of transport has not brought good news for Renfe.

Competition with

the French low-cost Ouigo and the Italian Iryo

has returned the company that operates the AVE and AVLO brands to losses after last year's profits.

The president of Renfe,

Raúl Blanco

, anticipated this Tuesday that the railway company closed 2023 with losses despite registering

522.3 million passengers, the second highest figure in its history

, thus showing that "margins are greatly affected" by the greatest competition.

This was commented at an informative breakfast organized by the Executive Forum in which he starred and in which he presented some numbers for the 2023 financial year. Blanco indicated that, although the accounts are still being closed, there will be losses again.

In 2022, Renfe recorded pre-tax losses of 108.6 million, 70% less than in 2021, and

last April it recorded its first net profit in fiscal year 2023 with 2.81 million.

Blanco commented that, with the railway operator's current figures, three or four years ago when there was no competition it would have recorded "very wide" margins.

The words of the president of Renfe now sound aligned with those of the Minister of Transport,

Óscar Puente,

who accused the public operator's competitors, specifically the French Ouigo, of competing with loss-making prices as they are covered by its public parent company from Paris.

The gross operating profit (Ebitda) was around 300 million, as anticipated, when in 2022 it was 292 million, and income reached 4,043.4 million in 2023, compared to total income of 4,127 the previous year. .

"Either we generate Ebitda and more income and we are more efficient, or we are going to have problems in the long run,"

warned the president of Renfe, who stressed that the company currently has capacity, but that it has to be "more attractive" than the competition and generate "more profits."

This "does not require

traumatic adjustments

," he said, but rather the work of all employees.

Talgo

On the other hand, the public company will raise its claims against Talgo by demanding greater financial compensation through judicial means to alleviate the loss of profits that it considers it has suffered in recent years due to the delay of the Avril trains, which should have been delivered by the company in July 2022, Europa Press reports

Sources close to the operator have explained that both the claim of

50 million euros for this lost profit and the 80,000 euros for each

additional day of delay starting next April 1 for damages requested from Talgo will be processed through the courts.

Added to all this are the

116.6 million euros claimed since 2022

due to the delay in the delivery of these vital trains for transport in Galicia and Asturias, an amount that in that case does not need judicial proceedings, as it is contained in the conditions of the contract.

However, Talgo has turned a deaf ear and assures that Renfe has not made any formal claim on that amount negotiated in the contract, although in a letter sent by Renfe to the train manufacturer, the operator assures that it has already formalized this request on several occasions. .