Air France-KLM Bond Issue Lands Amid Rising Risks to Summer Fun
- Variant threatens reopening as Merkel sounds note of caution
- Year of pandemic swelled airline debt to 50 billion euros
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Airlines are rushing to the bond market, hoping to cash in on the return of summer travel in Europe to repair balance sheets broken by the pandemic, even as a deadly wave of virus variant threatens to strand tourists.
Carrier Air France-KLM is set to raise 600 million euros ($716 million) Thursday to pay down debt including some state aid, as it tests the limits of investor appetite for an industry subsisting off government support and a reopening trade threatened by the spread of the delta variant first identified in India.