Credit Suisse has retained its 'outperform' recommendation on budget airline easyJet, saying that the company's March traffic statistics on Friday show good momentum and a creditable performance.The company said the number of passengers in March rose by 4.8% to 5,107,676 compared to a year earlier. The load factor, the number of passengers to the number of seats available, increased to 91.5% from 90.5% in the same month of 2013.The broker forecasts a £56m pre-tax loss for easyJet's first half, towards the lower end of guidance for a loss of £55-65m, "with March traffic seemingly supportive".For the full year ending September 2014, the bank is looking for a pre-tax profit of £576m, up from £478m the previous year, with results helped by the timing of Easter which will be in the third quarter.Credit Suisse said that easyJet trades at 16 times' prospective earnings, in line with sector peer Ryanair."It has closed a 10% valuation gap to Ryanair over the past two weeks yet having surpassed Ryanair returns/cash flow generation in 2013, we think it should trade at a premium. "We continue to see easyJet as a multi-year value proposition, and re-iterate our view [...] that easyJet should be able to capitalise on attractive medium-term volume and pricing opportunities." The bank kept its 2,021p target price for the stock, which was up 2.5% at 1,835p by 12:54 on Friday.BC