Dart Group, owner of Jet2.com and Jet2holidays, has reported a jump in operating profit to £131 million, a 27 per cent increase on last year.

The figure was driven by a 38 per cent rise in sales, to £2.39 billion, as more people jetted off on holiday.

Dart Group also gave an upbeat view of the future, despite Brexit uncertainty, which saw shares in the company rise 35 per cent this morning, to over £10 per share.

The company said demand for its package holidays grew by 24 per cent in the 12 months to the end of March, with 2.5 million holidaymakers travelling with the company.

At the same time, Jet2.com’s fleet of 75 aircraft flew over ten million passenger sectors, an increase of 46 per cent year-on-year.

The fleet has been expanded to 90 aircraft for this summer.

Looking forward, the group said: “Demand for our leisure travel product has strengthened since the start of the new financial year and given current forward bookings we expect that group profit before foreign exchange revaluations and taxation for the financial year ending March 31st, 2019, will substantially exceed current market expectations.”

Dart Group added that its strategy remains consistent – to grow both flight-only and package holiday offerings.

“Real Package holidays take considerable organisation and attention to detail and are not easily replicated by non-specialists,” the company said.

“The group dedicates significant resources to deliver an innovative and industry-leading product and together with our scale, experience, competitiveness and customer focused approach, we believe we have a strong and resilient leisure travel business.”