Tocumen Airport will pay  no dividends for 2 years

The  Panama State will not receive income from part of the operation of the Tocumen International Airport during 2021 and 2022.

The drop in passenger movement and the number of flights due to the measures by the Covid-19 pandemic continues to affect the income of the state-owned airport corporation.

Raffoul Arab, manager of Tocumen, said that the airport does not have the financial index established in the bond issues to transfer dividends to the State.

Between 2015 and 2019, Tocumen paid $118.4 million in dividends.

As of last June, the airport’s revenue had decreased 15% compared to the first six months of 2020.

In early August, Tocumen closed a debt issue for $1.855 billion. Of this total, just over 1.4 billion were used to refinance the debt held by the airport and the rest will be used to increase the liquidity of the air terminal.

Given the drop in revenue projected for 2022, Tocumen plans to renegotiate the transfer of funds that it must make to other entities, such as the Civil Aviation Authority.