A couple of days ago I spoke with a South African outfitter and he mentioned that a very significant number of clients had postponed hunts due to the recent price increases in flights. He indicated this was a very widespread thing this season, and that it pointed to a lackluster year for most African outfitters. I know personally, that the ticket I bought six months ago is now selling for 50% higher prices than I paid, which is a non-trivial amount of $$$.
Let's hope there's a quick resolution to the mess in the Strait of Hormuz, and the safari industry will have a banner year next season as the price of flying returns to normal.
Prices wont drop quickly. For a variety of reasons. United's CEO flat out said they are going to keep raising prices until people stop buying tickets, which hasn't happened yet. U.S. legacy carriers have used the price increases to significantly boost their profits and their stock prices have been hitting all time highs as a result.
I know that a lot of foreign carriers hedge pretty heavily to help mitigate spikes, so they will spend the rest of the summer charging higher prices to help make up for the losses from earlier in the summer. Japan airlines for example updates their fuel surcharges every two months.
I have been watching the price of Turkish Airlines and United Airlines round trips for Denver to Jo'burg for late next may. Through Istanbul on Turkish and Newark on United. Turkish hasn't raised the price of the base fair, but their fuel surcharge has roughly doubled from ~$850 to ~$1700. The total fare has gone from ~$7500 to ~$8400. I'm hoping Turkish readjusts their fuel surcharges in late August or early September.
United on the other hand doesn't have "fuel surcharges" but their ticket prices have gone from ~$11,000 to ~$21,000, which should be criminal, but as their CEO said, if people will pay it, they will charge it.
Jet fuel prices have already halved since the peak during the "not a war" and there is no reason to think they wont keep dropping. The UAE has already ditched OPEC, Iraq is either going to do the same, or completely ignore the caps very soon. U.S. production is at an all time high, demand has also softened significantly. There is a solid case for $50-$55 barrels by year end and Mid to low $40s early next year. China has shown that renewables are their plan forward and they'll just burn more domestically mined coal rather than buy over priced oil. Europe has been accelerating their move away from fossil fuels since 2022 and will work to move faster in that direction now. The only thing that will put a floor under oil prices in the next 18-24 months will be another fabricated, unnecessary "crisis".
