Originally Posted by
TenYearsGone
My opinion is that our stock has always reflected our balance sheet. We are one of the highest debt airlines out there. Wall Street knows this thus punishes our stock.
If anyone in my circle of friends had a debt/income ratio like Delta; we would call them "irresponsible". However, our mngmt team is praised
.
Go look at any financial site. Our long term debt is over 40 billion dollars. We need to get this number lower and faster because UCAL is about to emerge as a solid competitor with about 18 billion dollars less debt than us.
TEN
Where did all that debt come from? I mean, it can't ALL be from buying 600+ RJ's, can it? I know that's DAL+NW debt, but $40 Billion? Please tell me some of that is long term DB retirement payouts.
When I was hired Delta had the lowest Debt/Equity ratio in the industry, and they said that was the key ingredient to them having never lost money for a single quarter, let alone a full year, but that was 5 management teams ago.
I remember when Mo'Ron started borrowing to buy MD11's, then LEO the CEO and RJ Fred bought a zillion RJ's, our debt went through the roof.
No wonder Anderson wants to park 200 of them and is only interested in buying 'used airplanes, cheap'.
Hmmm...I wonder who's got some used 777's they might not need??
