Australia's travel giant Flight Centre has posted a A$662 million statutory loss after tax — down from last year's A$264 million profit — due to the hit from the coronavirus.

Excluding one-offs, the company's fall in underlying earnings was even bigger, at A$853 million, to a pre-tax loss of A$510 million, ABC News reports.

Flight Centre shares swung between modest losses and gains before ending 0.2 per cent lower at A$12.58.

The company said it had recorded a $150 million underlying profit for the eight months to February, but that evaporated in March as the global coronavirus pandemic was declared, before mounting losses in April, May and June pulled the result deep into the red.

Flight Centre said it had cut about $1.9 billion in annual costs, leaving its expenses at just 30 per cent of pre-COVID levels.

However, it reported that July revenue was just 7 per cent of pre-pandemic levels at $17 million (excluding refunds).

Last month, the travel agency said A$53 million in costs went out the door, but A$10 million in JobKeeper payments would reduce that to a monthly loss of A$43 million.

As at June 30, the company had received $98 million worth of government subsidies globally.

The company had just under A$1.9 billion in cash and equivalents on hand at June 30, and total current assets of A$2.44 billion, versus total current liabilities of A$1.86 billion.

That suggests it can keep operating at current loss levels for up to a year without raising more funds, depending on its arrangements with lenders.

In response, the company said it had raised more than A$1.1 billion in extra cash and available funds to keep operating, while also slashing its costs.It also said it could get back to 40 per cent of its pre-coronavirus business at the current level of staffing and costs, which would enable it to break even as travel gradually resumed, which Flight Centre's managing director Graham Turner said was occurring in some regions.

"Travel is starting to gradually recover in locations like North America, Europe and South Africa, where domestic borders are now open, although we are

also seeing heightened restrictions in Australia and New Zealand, after earlier relaxations," he said in a statement.

Turner said, despite nearly 40 years in operation, nobody at Flight Centre could have imagined the current circumstances where virtually all international travel had ceased.

"We were forced to make some very tough decisions as this crisis unfolded, but we were very fortunate to be able to draw on our strong balance sheet," he said.

"We also moved quickly to develop a longer cash and liquidity runway and to lower costs in anticipation of a zero- or very-low-revenue environment for an extended period of time."

Flight Centre has closed around half of its physical stores globally and sought rent reductions for others.

The company has also stood down or laid off about 70 per cent of its staff, with a 50 per cent reduction in executive and director pay for the fourth quarter and ongoing reductions this financial year.-Photo: ABC News

Flight Centre plunges deeper into the red