Both passenger numbers and passenger revenues increased in 2007 compared with 2006. In 2007, DSB's pre-tax profits totalled DKK 854 million, which is DKK 154 mil-lion lower than in 2006 (DKK 1,008 million). This is primarily due to in-creased expenses to customer oriented initiatives, which i.a. have entailed im-proved punctuality. Furthermore, increased financial expenses and falling revenue from traffic contracts have contributed to the lower result.

    Passenger revenues increased by 3 per cent compared with 2006
Passenger revenues totalled DKK 4,391 million in 2007 (DKK 4,264 million), which is an increase of DKK 127 million compared with 2006.

    Profit before depreciation, amortisation and write-downs totalled DKK 2,744 million (DKK 2,873 million)
The decrease can primarily be ascribed to decreasing revenue from traffic con-tracts and planned paid additional expenses to customer service initiatives.

    Number of passengers increased by 1.9 million
The total number of passengers increased by 1 per cent. Of this, the number of passengers on the long-distance and regional train lines increased by 5 per cent to 69.4 million passengers, while the number of S-train passengers de-creased by 2 per cent, which i.a. is due to track works on the Køge Line and the take over of Lille Nord by Lokalbanen in northern Zealand.

    Improved punctuality
Punctuality in 2007 improved compared with 2006. In spite of speed reduc-tions and several track works during the year, punctuality in 2007 improved significantly by 6.1 percentage points to 89.6 per cent for long-distance and regional trains and by 2.4 percentage points to 91.6 for S-trains.

    IC4 status
At present four train sets have been approved for operation with passengers on the Lindholm - Aalborg - Århus - Fredericia - Padborg line. The customers have expressed great satisfaction with the IC4 in surveys. Next phase in the approval process is a factual type approval of the IC4 for commissioning in single operating train sets in national traffic. On 4 March 2008, AnsaldoBreda submitted an application for approval with Trafikstyrelsen. In this connection, further test runs must be carried out before type approval can be issued. These test runs have been initiated and the first train set is ready to be com-missioned for service in national traffic when the approval has been given by the authorities.

    The Øresund bid
In 2007, together with its British partner First Group plc, DSB won both the Swedish and the Danish tenders for the Øresund traffic. Start of operations will be 11 January 2009. After the closing of the accounts for 2007, the con-tracts were signed in January 2008.

Expectations to profits before tax for 2008
Profits before tax in 2008 are expected to be in the region of DKK 600 million, which is less than profits for 2007. This is primarily due to profits before tax for 2007 being inclusive profits from sale of fixed assets of DKK 205 million. Further-more, in 2008 there will be increasing interest costs, increasing energy costs and increasing depreciation on fixed assets. Conversely, expectations to profits before tax are affected by a positive expectation to the development in passenger num-bers for both S-train and long-distance and regional train services. For 2008, a number of new customer and product initiatives have been planned, which to-gether with in-creased national awareness of climate and sustainability are ex-pected to attract more customers in 2008.