Originally Posted by Bucking Bar

A few prognosticators, including a hedge fund manager, are predicting doom and gloom coming in Delta's March 22 Raymond James presentation. Significance is seen in the timing of the presentation prior to the opening of the market.

I've been increasingly aware of a call for management to "do something" to stop the erosion of Delta's share price which has been declining even with fuel prices adjusting down. Economists are saying fuel, if not for Japan, would be about $130Bbl on the coasts. Maybe that is what the market sees, or perhaps they are just concerned about an overall slow down in economic activity, which tends to have a larger effect on the airlines than other entities.

Given that United/CAL, US Air and American have all pulled some capacity (leaving room for the LCC to grow btw) my guess is that we'll hear an announcement of reduced capacity as our mainline jets are retired in favor of outsourced flying in smaller capacities. The mega big bid which was going to allegedly happen about now will likely hold us about status quo. It would not surprise me to see CVG close, but I am not expecting it.

Anyone else got a guess?

Originally Posted by Sink r8

I would imagine the revised guidance will be lower (there's a surprise), and I've had the same thought about the timing. But then again, United is presenting at 11:05 AM, and UsAirways at 10:25 AM. Does that mean they expect good results? ... so I think the timing relates more to scheduling and coincidence than anything else.

My guess is that we will say that we're leading the industry in capacity retsraint, have already announced accelerated retirements of less fuel-efficient fleets, will consider further cuts as needed, are reducing CAPEX to a more prudent level, but will continue to invest in the product. Growth guidance of flat may not do the trick, so we'll forecast down 1-3% (pulling all this out of thin air). Since we go up first on most conferences, and on quarterly results, since we're 84% owned by institutional investors, and since we got spanked two quarters ago by not sounding negative enough on capacity, my guess is it will quite the sobering talk. "Growth" will be a taboo word, and every sentence will feature the term "capacity restraint" at least once.

I doubt CVG goes, but who knows? The AE will be delayed, or be roughly neutral, as the company stays in a defensive posture.

At any rate, if any gloom and doom comes forth, it won't be a surprise to anyone that invests in airline stocks. I'm guessing the bad news in the stock in mostly baked in, and maybe it goes down further Monday, and up after the conference. I am, however, also guessing the sobering news will ding the carriers perceived as being weaker. I had added AMR stock, but I took the loss on most of it and sold for now.