Originally Posted by Razor

Not good numbers coming out about Delta's performance. The stock price is nice however.


Delta Air Lines Inc.'s (DAL) passenger traffic continued to weaken in December as the carrier's underperformance relative to peers continued.

Many U.S. airlines have cut capacity to cope with a decline in both business and leisure travel. A handful of U.S. airlines, including low-cost carrier AirTran Airways, a unit of Air Tran Holdings Inc. (AAI), and Continental Airlines Inc. (CAL) reported this week that their traffic rose in December from a year earlier, as they continued to claw back from last summer's nadir, when many were reporting double-digit-percentage declines.

But not everyone landed in positive territory, with AMR Corp.'s (AMR) American Airlines and US Airways Group Inc. (LCC) also reporting that traffic fell.

Delta, the world's largest carrier, reported Thursday that traffic levels were down 7.5% amid an 8% drop in capacity. Just over a year ago, Delta completed its acquisition of Northwest Airlines. The percentage of seats filled at Delta rose 0.4 percentage point in December to 81.2%.

In the U.S., traffic fell 6.3%, as capacity contracted 4% and as so-called load factor fell 2 percentage points to 80.2%. International traffic fell 9.3% amid a deeper 14% drop in capacity, allowing load factor to increase 4.2 points to 82.9%.

Delta shares were up 5% at $12.72 in recent trading amid a rally for airline stocks, which were reacting in part to a pause to crude oil's recent gains.


-By Tess Stynes, Dow Jones Newswires


Delta, Comair on-time rates soar
Business Courier of Cincinnati

Delta Air Lines and its Comair subsidiary greatly improved their on-time rates in November – but so did most other airlines, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Air Travel Consumer Report.

The major carriers overall reported an average on-time rate of 88.6 percent in November, the highest since the DOT began compiling statistics in 1995.

Delta posted a December on-time rate of 87.4 percent, up from 79.4 percent in October, but its ranking among the 19 major airlines fell to 13th from sixth. Comair improved its rate to 86.2 percent from 75.1 percent, and dropped one notch in the ranking, to 16th.

The Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport had a November on-time arrival rate of 91 percent and an on-time departure rate of 89.1 percent. That compares with an on-time arrival rate of 84.4 percent, and an on-time departure rate of 86.4 percent.

Delta boosted its performance in the mishandled baggage category, to 3.51 reports per 1,000 passengers, versus 4.4 reports in October, but fell to 15th from 14th in the ranking. Comair fell to 17th from 16th, with 3.82 reports per 1,000 passengers, compared to 5.08 the month before.

Delta retained its last-place ranking for consumer complaints, with 1.79 per 100,000 enplanements, up from 1.7 in October. Comair moved up to sixth place from 14th, with 0.42 complaints per 100,000 enplanements, compared to 0.92 the previous month.

Atlanta-based Delta (NYSE: DAL) operates a hub at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport. Comair is based in Erlanger.