IAG welcomes signs of recovery at Iberia International Airlines Group moved to an operating profit of €245m in the second quarter, indicating signs of recovery at its Spanish carrier Iberia and lifted by increased profit from British Airways. Some 1,700 staff have left Iberia so far, out of a total of 3,300 agreed upon with a mediator, while remaining flight and cabin crew have taken pay cuts of 18 per cent. The airline had faced strong opposition from unions in its attempt to cut costs and suffered from the resulting strikes. IN Airlines Willie Walsh, group chief executive, said the benefits of Iberia's turnround programme were beginning to show. This is the first step in the restructuring but it is already bearing fruit with Iberia's losses down from €93m last year to €35m, reversing the negative trend of the last 11 quarters. In the same period last year International Airlines Group, formed from the merger of British Airways and Iberia in 2011, had made a loss of €4m. It outstripped the consensus forecast for its operating profit of €163m. The signs of Iberia's recovery pushed shares in IAG up 3.16 per cent in early trading to 306.1p BA's performance was supported by a strong London market and transatlantic traffic. Its operating profit in the quarter was up from €94m last year to €247m, the group said in its results for the half year to June 30. IAG's pre-tax loss for the half year was €177m, compared with €357m in the same period last year. Revenue was up 2.1 per cent at €8.7bn for the first half, the period that is generally weakest for airlines. The group bought remaining shares in the Spanish low-cost airline Vueling in April for €124m to give it a 90.5 per cent stake in what it sees as an important source of growth. Vueling recorded an operating profit of €27m in the six months to June 30.