Originally Posted by slowplay

It's substantially different on several levels. The biggest ones are balance sheets and core business performance. While the timing wasn't perfect for DAL/NWA, it's relatively awful for CAL/UAUA.

DAL/NWA was able to extract $2 billion in "free" money from Amex to remain the preferred credit card provider for the new airline. UAL/CAL won't have that opportunity in this econcomic environment, especially since much of Mileage Plus is already collateralized.