Budget airline easyJet has notched up a 34% increase in annual profits and said the “future for the company is bright”.

The carrier reported headline pre-tax profits of £610 million for the year to September 30, up from £455 million 12 months earlier.

It carried 7% more passengers in the most recent 12-month period at 89.7 million.

Trading was also boosted by strong demand for easyJet Holidays, with the division seeing pre-tax profits jump to £190 million, up 56% from a year earlier.

It has been a privilege to lead easyJet for the past seven years

This was driven by a growth in customer numbers of 36%.

Outgoing chief executive Johan Lundgren, who will be replaced by chief financial officer Kenton Jarvis on January 1, said the financial results reflect “the effectiveness and execution of our strategy as well as continued popularity of our flights and holidays”.

He went on: “It also represents a significant step towards our goal of sustainably generating over £1 billion annual profit before tax.”

Mr Lundgren said he is “extremely proud of all that has been achieved” during his seven years as the boss of easyJet, and “the future for the company is bright”.

Mr Jarvis said: “The airline will continue to grow, particularly on popular longer leisure routes like north Africa and the Canaries.

“I am looking forward to taking over the controls of this fantastic business in the new year and we still have a lot to go for as we progress towards our ambitious targets.”

Asked about his plans as chief executive, he replied: “Our clear purpose as an airline is to make low-cost travel easy, so to make it easy in terms of being accessible and reliable for the customer, and make it low-cost so that it can be affordable for the customer.

“That’s why easyJet was founded on that premise nearly 30 years ago and that’s what we really want to focus on as a business.”

He expressed his belief that easyJet Holidays has “a lot of potential” to increase customer numbers further.

He said: “In the UK we’ve seen great growth this year. Our customers have gone from 1.9 million to 2.6 million.

“But that’s a move from 5% to 7% (package holiday) market share in the UK.

“We know that the bigger tour operators, Tui and Jet2, both have almost 20% each, so there’s a lot of opportunity for easyJet Holidays.”

EasyJet said its airline business reduced winter losses by £40 million through “a combination of productivity and utilisation benefits”.

It received 16 new A320neo aircraft in the year, raising the average number of seats on its planes from 179 to 181, resulting in cost efficiencies of around £25 million.

EasyJet’s board is recommending dividend payments totalling £92 million are made to shareholders, up from £34 million last year.

This represents 20% of the headline profit after tax.

EasyJet said it expects to reduce winter losses again in 2024/25, with a “significant improvement” in the three months to the end of December.

It also anticipates that available seat kilometres – a measure combining its available seats with the distance flown – will increase by around 8% in the next 12 months.

The average length of its flights is expected to rise by around 5%.