Ryanair concentrating on cash, could be debt free by 2023-CFO

DUBLIN, May 19 (Reuters) - Ryanair plans to finance itself through cash generation in the coming months and if it continues to do so, could be debt free by 2023 when 1.7 billion euros ($1.90 billion) of recent debut bond issuance matures, its finance chief said on Thursday.

"This year we're probably going to concentrate more on cash because at the moment the carry cost on one percent debt is just that little bit too expensive for us," Chief Financial Officer Neil Sorahan said in a speech.

"We have very strong cash balances and despite having returned 4.4 billion (euros) to our shareholders over the last eight years we still remain cash positive in the business. If we keep going the way we are going, we could be debt free by 2023." ($1 = 0.8926 euros) (Reporting by Padraic Halpin and John Geddie; Editing by Keith Weir)