Lithuania, Railways, Transport

The company notes, however, that its revenue, having dropped in the first half of this year, went back up to the 2019 level in September already when revenue stood at 40.4 million euros, compared to 41 million euros in September, 2019.

"We considered both very pessimistic and more optimistic business scenarios at the beginning of the pandemic, and we can be cautiously optimistic when looking into the September result. I do believe the curve will continue going up," Mantas Bartuska, CEO of Lietuvos Gelezinkeliai, said in a statement.

LTG Cargo, the group's freight transportation arm, carried 38.8 million tons of cargo in January-September, down 6% from a year earlier. But volumes rose 9% to 5 million tons in September.

Meanwhile, the group's passenger transportation arm, LTG Link, saw its operation volumes go down 28% this year as it carried 2.52 million passengers in the nine months, including 331,000 in September alone, down 13% year-on-year. International train routes are still closed due to the pandemic.

In the first half of this year, the group posted 235.9 million euros in revenue, a drop of 11.9% from the same period last year. It received 505.5 million euros in revenue last year and earned a net profit of 58.1 million euros.