By Joe Hoppe

Ryanair Holdings PLC on Thursday cut its fiscal 2021 traffic forecast figure to below 30 million passengers from below 35 million, and will cut flight schedules in January in response to new measures aimed at slowing the spread of the coronavirus pandemic.

The low-cost airline said new cutbacks will reduce traffic forecasts for the year ended March 31 to between 26 million and 30 million passengers, and that it will cut flight schedules from Jan. 21 until travel restrictions in the U.K. and Ireland are removed.

It now expects January passengers to fall to less than 1.3 million, and February and March passenger numbers to fall as low as half a million a month.

Ryanair said it doesn't expect flight cuts and traffic reductions to materially affect its net loss for the year, as many of the flights would be loss-making anyway. Customers affected by flight cuts will receive emails entitling them to free moves and refunds later today, the company said.

Write to Joe Hoppe at joseph.hoppe@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

01-07-21 0232ET