Originally Posted by
pilot64golfer
We just made $900M in the 2nd quarter and going to make over $1B in the 3rd quarter. Both will be quarterly records. That's "data".
And I don't care how much DAL said they made because they aren't taking 787s and 35 guppies this year, when 1st year capital depreciation is at its highest.
Why does no one compare us to Southwest, the largest US domestic airline, where we almost doubled their 2nd quarter profit of $475M.
United could certainly perform a lot better, but in our 75+ year history we just set an all-time financial performance record.
I'm not thrilled with the performance, but we are doing damn good IMO.
Let's keep things in perspective, please.
UAL was also doing great late 90's - 9/11. At the time we were a massively bloated airline. But the economy was so good, and the revenue environment so high, we looked great, for a few short years.
Our current predicament isn't as bad in some ways, but the reason we just reported high earnings is just the revenue environment. "A rising tide raises all boats".
A lot is being made of how many aircraft we are taking delivery of. Guess what, it is just the normal rate of aircraft replacement, assuming a 25 year life for an airframe. We are taking delivery of about 4 - 5% of our fleet in new aircraft per year. Our fleet is not "new" it is just not as old as DAL's.
Less than 10% of our fleet is in the first 2 years of their lives. The high depreciation rate that you speak of affects only a very small fraction of our overall fleet.