But they are not invincible
Apr 5th 2018 | DUBAI,HONG KONG AND SINGAPORE
ANYONE who doubts the ambitions of China’s airlines need only look over the plans for Daxing International Airport, which will serve Beijing after it opens in late 2019. It will be the world’s biggest airport by far, with eight runways and room for 100m passengers a year. The new facilities are needed to serve a fast-growing appetite for air travel. The three Chinese carriers that will dominate the passenger traffic passing through Daxing’s cavernous halls are all in rapid ascent. And that has rivals everywhere complaining about the sorts of subsidies that have fuelled airlines since the dawn of commercial aviation.
China’s airlines are adding passengers at a rate not seen since Emirates, Etihad and Qatar Airways started to attract customers to their Gulf hubs, handily placed between Europe and Asia, with a winning combination of cheap fares and superior service.Between 2010 and 2017 passenger numbers on China’s three biggest carriers grew by 70%, to 339m (see chart). That growth has translated into some financial high-flying. At the end of March China Southern, Asia’s biggest airline, and China Eastern both reported record annual profits. Air China’s share price fell after it announced that it had only made its best profits since 2011.
cavernous: of a building or room -- resembling a large cave: very large
南航和东航在三月份都发布了破记录的年利润，而国航的股价则下跌了，自从2011年达到最高利润，从海航的载客量来看真是异军突起，表现特别好！
As China’s carriers expand, their Gulf rivals, which for a decade have seen passenger growth of over 10% a year, are languishing. Slower expansion—or in Qatar’s case, shrinkage—has hit profits hard. It is natural to expect China’s carriers to eclipse those from the Gulf, says Will Horton of CAPA, a consultancy. Those Gulf airlines rely on long-haul passengers connecting in their hubs. China’s carriers are built on more solid foundations of fast-growing local demand. A total of 549m passengers took to the air last year, compared with 184m in 2007. The International Air Transport Association (IATA), a trade group, predicts that China will overtake America as the world’s biggest aviation market by 2022, and will go on to hit a total of 1.5bn passengers by 2036.
Much of that growth is on international routes. Over the past decade airlines in mainland China have opened over 100 new long-haul routes. These flights mainly serve an increasing urge among Chinese for foreign travel. The number of tourists going abroad, mostly by plane, has rocketed in the past decade, from 41m a year to over 130m. As a result, Chinese airlines are gobbling market share, says Dave Emerson of Bain & Company, a consultancy. Between 2011 and 2017 the capacity on Chinese planes flying between China and America rose from 37% to 61%, reckons OAG, a flight-data firm.
The battle to fly the Chinese around the globe is not the front that most concerns the world’s other big international airlines, however. The Gulf carriers took business from American and European airlines by getting the world to fly through their hubs.Chinese airlines are also now making the most of their location, and the largesse of the state, to offer connections to destinations beyond their home market.
中国的航空公司是建立在本国强劲的内需上的（就是国内市场巨大），然后大部分的增长都是国际长航线！但令国外航空公司最害怕的不是和中国竞争中国客源，而是中国航空公司开始和他们抢中转客源...
largesse: somewhat formal--- the act of giving away money or the quality of a person who gives away money (这个单词早上读 The Girl You Left Behind 的时候刚好遇到了，这种学习单词的感觉超爽）
Chinese regulators limit competition on domestic routes, allowing airlines to make healthy profits to cross-subsidise loss-making international routes chosen to reward allies such as Cuba. China’s smaller cities also give handouts to airlines (around$1.3bn in 2016) to launch new long-haul routes from their airports. All this has created more seats than locals can fill. So the carriers are selling them cheap to foreign travellers looking for a long-haul bargain, explains Mr Horton. The Chinese authorities encourage the practice. They are, for example, loosening immigration checks on connecting travellers and giving some visa-free access to China for six days.
This is hitting regional rivals hardest. Many Asian carriers were struggling long before the threat from Chinese airlines arose. Carriers such as Malaysia Airlines had allowed costs to run out of control, thanks to poor management and political meddling. But since the visa rules changed, even comparatively well-run airlines, such as Cathay Pacific, have had to contend with a sea of red ink. Airlines globally may be enjoying an era of record profitability but earnings per passenger for those in Asia have slumped by a sixth since 2015, according to IATA.
Airlines in America and Europe have less at stake, even if many are already nursing losses on their Chinese operations. But coming on top of competition from low-cost rivals and the Gulf carriers, the arrival of the Chinese acts as another spur to calls for protectionism. America’s three biggest carriers want the “open-skies” agreements that enable the Gulf carriers to fly to America revoked. In Europe, Air France-KLM and Lufthansa have been lobbying for a proposed reform of Regulation 868, which would allow the EU to impose sanctions on foreign airlines that get state subsidies.
contend with: to deal with something difficult or unpleasant
spur: something that makes you want to do something or that causes something to happen: incentive
在中国航空公司的竞争出现前，像那些管理不好的区域航恐公司，例如马来西亚航空，早就在挣扎求存了。但当中国放宽对中转客人的签证要求后，那些运行很好的公司像国泰航空，也开始要面对各种强有力的竞争了...焦头烂额是必须的了
These tactics will not work on China, warns Andrew Charlton of Aviation Advocacy, a consultancy.Unlike the Gulf states, China is an emerging superpower. It has the power to hit competitors where it hurts. Last June it fined Emirates 29,000 yuan($4,270) and banned it from expanding in China for six months on trumped-up charges over safety lapses. A trade war over flying rights will hit the West harder than China, which is fast becoming a sizeable exporter of tourists.
Foreign airlines may yet get some respite. The growth in international passengers on Chinese carriers is already slowing, from a breakneck pace of 33% in 2015 to a merely rapid 12% forecast for this year. Many politicians are starting to ask whether some of the subsidies are value for money. And Chinese regulators are belatedly liberalising the domestic market by giving up their control of fares, potentially leaving carriers with less spare cash to subsidise foreign operations. Some smaller airlines are already hitting financial trouble. Hainan Airlines, the country’s fourth-largest carrier, looks wobbly and its owner, HNAGroup, is struggling to pay creditors.
And foreigners have ways to fight back. Qantas and Singapore Airlines, for example, are keen to use ultra-haul-long direct flights to attract business travellers keen not to have a layover. The take-off of Chinese airlines looks unstoppable. That does not make them invincible.
belatedly: happening or coming very late or too late
国外的航空公司可以小休息一下了，中国航司国际客源的增长已经在放缓，从以前的33% 降到今年预计的12% 。一些规模小一点的航空公司财务也开始出现问题，像海航集团已经开始挣扎还贷款了...
invincible: impossible to defeat or overcome: unbeatable
外航也不是没有办法反击，像新加坡航空和Qantas 就开通一些超级长直飞航线来吸引一些公务客源，这些公务客源不希望中转浪费时间，而且都是高利润的客人！
总结：看着这篇文章就感觉自己是其中的一部分（09年到14年在南航工作），南航当年在不断地推广中转，跟国泰新航等抢中转客源（澳洲到欧洲往返的客源），中国航司雄起！
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Results
Lexile®Measure: 1200L - 1300L
Mean Sentence Length: 18.36
Mean Log Word Frequency: 3.07
Word Count: 1050
这篇文章的蓝思值是在1200-1300L， 是经济学人里中等难度的文章~
使用kindle断断续续地读《经济学人》三年，发现从一开始磕磕碰碰到现在比较顺畅地读完，进步很大，推荐购买！点击这里可以去亚马逊官网购买~
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