Mr Váradi said: “Clearly from an overall market perspective, demand is suffering. All our competitors are struggling, as we’ve seen from Ryanair and Lufthansa recently.
“Western Europe is becoming a more saturated market. But this is not unique to airlines. We’re seeing softening consumer demand across many sectors.”
Full-year revenue and profit will be lower than previously predicted, Wizz said. The London-listed company’s shares fell 18pc, the steepest decline on the FTSE 250 index.
The carrier’s situation was complicated by the recall of dozens of Airbus A320-family jets with faulty Pratt & Whitney engines. An average of 46 of the planes were out of service during the quarter, leading Wizz to draft in eight others from specialist providers in order to defend its market share.
Mr Váradi said: “That came with costs and in hindsight we could probably have saved on those leases.”
A rolling programme of repairs should mean the number of idled aircraft drops below 40 next summer, he said. At the same time, Wizz is scheduled to take delivery of 70 more planes.
While net profit slumped 98pc to €1.2m (£1m), the capacity restrictions at least meant that Wizz fares held up.
Ryanair said last week that ticket prices fell 15pc in the quarter as it resorted to deep discounting to fill its planes, sending the stock down as much as 18pc.
On Wednesday, Lufthansa reported a 40pc drop in operating profit for the three months, trimmed its full-year guidance and launched a restructuring programme, saying prices had declined amid what it called a “normalisation” of fares following the post-pandemic travel boom.
