Originally Posted by Carl Spackler

Just got word that Shiznit has reincarnated to the screen name...

Wait for it,

Wait for it,

Professor.

I'm stunned I tell you. Stunned.

Carl

Originally Posted by Carl Spackler

Lot of ifs there t, and that's the problem. Tons of examples of stock buy back programs not working. Delta under Leo was one example.

If there was any correlation with stock buy back programs and an advancing stock price, you could make a killing. There's not. In fact, Delta stock is now behaving like a lot of stock performance after the program is announced. Straight down.

If anything, the best play on a stock after buy back announcements is an optioned short position. In my opinion of course.

Carl

Originally Posted by Carl Spackler

Exactly like Orvil says. A junior captain is vulnerable to displacement as senior FO's give up and bid captain. If you're a junior captain, you're vulnerable to this.

Carl

Originally Posted by orvil

The investment theory is stock buy backs provide a floor where the stock price won't drop below. This only works as long as there is money to repurchase stock. If the underlying company is crap, it won't save it. Eventually, there has to be a point where they can't support it anymore.

Originally Posted by Timbo

Think about where all the 747 F/O's are going to displace to.

If this thing goes through, instead of them displacing to say, senior 777 F/O or senior A330 F/O, they will probably say, "Well, that whole LCA trip drop thing was great while it lasted, but it sucks so bad now, I'm going to displace into the 767ER Captain seat.".

Presto, the junior 767 Captains are displaced to the 737, and those junior Captains displace to the 88, and those junior Captains have a party because they HATE flying the MD88!

You guys are playing checkers, Richard is playing chess. You all need to look about 2-3 years (at least!) down the road to see the same thing Richard is seeing and setting the table for today.

Originally Posted by SayAlt

Good lord.

Now Bender (aka Tsquare) is attempting to claim...in effect...that RA is a moron who doesn't know what he's doing re: the stock buyback, all the while using quaint mgmt phrases like "move the needle".

(sigh)

And people wonder why I advised putting him on ignore. You can't make this **** up.

.

Originally Posted by Mem9guy

I spent several hours over the last 2 days looking at the published Contract Comparison, the ALPA "conceptual opener," and the TA, as well as thinking about my survey responses.

If you take the time to do this, you should not need a roadshow to decide how to vote. I am a solid NO vote as this whole process seems to be an absurd failure by our Negotiators and MEC.

The TA in no way reflects what was asked in the survey, and does not seem to attain anything alluded to in our opener.

If you go back and look at the comparison document, you will see that this TA does not make us industry leading by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, we have even reverse pattern bargained by giving up things like FO Bidding to erase some of the gains that we had made on AA and United. The NN even called the new sick leave policy "the best in the industry" while the comparison clearly states otherwise.

I am not sure how this thing got so bad but it is clearly an overreach by the company for which they want to grossly underpay.

NO WAY!

Originally Posted by gloopy

This will be a very damaging TA regardless of how we vote on it. It we pass it we eat massive concessions all around, including unprecidented foreign alter ego airlines and a lower and further reduceable AF/KLM JV. If we vote against it it will take a strong effort to overcome the baseline it created.

So I propose we gift the company 100 million dollars.

That's right, and I'm not kidding.

If the net value of this TA is supposedly 1.1B over 3 years, and assuming it was properly comprehensively costed out (I don't think it was, but the company and the NC will absolutely stand by that it was) then when we vote it down let's offer 1.0B over 3 years to our current contract and put it in payrates alone. Nothing else. Nothing. Else.

The company couldn't possibly have a problem with that, could they? If the true net cost was 1.1B extra and we're offering them a free 100M (to return to the shareholders! Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!) then they would be a fiduciary obligation for them to accept that.

Assuming this TA was properly costed out all around that is. Which further assumes they would *never* do any of the worst case things that they *could* do IAW this TA, like massive sick harassment on a scale never before seen, foreign alter egos, 75/76's against a new A380 order for our "partners" AF/KLM, etc.

If the true cost of the pros and cons cost 1.1B extra, from our point of view and theirs, give them one hundred million dollars, or donate it to the charity of their choice, and put the 1.0B into pay rates alone and stick with current book.

What possibe problem could they have with that?