STOCKHOLM: Scandinavian airline SAS said it would take a writedown of 1.7 billion crowns ($250.50 million) related to its holding in Spaniar, which ceased operations late on Friday.
SAS, half owned by the governments of Sweden, Norway and Denmark, said its 10.9 percent stake in Spanair had already been written down to zero in the company's books before the airline stopped flying.
"Due to the situation in Spanair, SAS has decided to make a writedown of the outstanding debt and receivables on Spanair of approximately 165 million euros ($216.7 million) as well as a reserve of 28 million euros in guarantees and costs," SAS said in a statement.
The airline did not say when the writedown would be taken. SAS has for years been struggling with cut-price rivals and an aged fleet of planes and has not made a full-year profit since 2007.
But years of efficiency measures have started to bear fruit and the airline aimed at getting back to pretax profit in 2011. However, the downturn has made this more difficult and CEO Rickard Gustafson said earlier this month that profit in 2011 would be marginal. SAS said in its statement it saw a "positive result before non-recurring items for the full year 2011."
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