Ryanair's Michael O’Leary back on flight path for potential near-€100m payout

Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary is flying high while other firms are under scrutiny over climate action, write Eamon Quinn and Ronan Smyth

Ryanair chief executive Michael O'Leary has long-held 44m shares in the company, which are worth around €730m.

Near record profits and a share price up by more than a third since the start of the year have put Ryanair chief Michael O’Leary firmly back in the cockpit at the airline — for more reasons than one.

At well over €1.4bn, Ryanair’s after-tax profits for its latest financial year — as unveiled earlier this week — didn’t quite reach the heights before the onset of the pandemic, but were nonetheless close enough to suggest that sales and profits would soon be flying even higher.