He just trolls along hoping to get someone to bite in the F9 forums. Apparently the margaritas aren't working anymore...

Guess you’re right. Must be rough working for a company where you’re constantly hoping for a big change like a merger. I, for one, hope we never merge with anybody.

How quickly we forget.

More like how quickly things change I think.

This part of “we” hasn’t forgotten anything but there aren’t many pilots with whom I’d trade places today.

I tend to agree with you, G4 and F9 have very different business models when you pull back the curtain - like the items you identified above. G4 utilization is around 6.5-7.5hrs/day while I think F9 is like 12hrs/day. That is a huge difference. G4 rarely acquires new aircraft, and rarely leases (leased 12 from ALAFCO in 2018 but I think only half of those made it to service).

G4 has over 80% of its routes as non-competitive (not just ULCC non-competitive, but non-competitive period). F9 is not afraid to take on other airlines and compete based solely on price in primary markets, G4 avoids that competition. Not to say one is better than the other, you'd be a moron to doubt Indigo. And G4 consistently has some of the highest operating margins in the industry.

If G4 wanted to acquire F9 they should have done it a decade ago, pre-Indigo. I think margarita got the $750m cash from the cash and cash equivalents in as of end of Q4 which were $685m ($152.8m cash and $532.5m short term investments). Either way, its a lot of cash to be sitting on (especially with the gov cheese continuing to flow) but not enough to seriously make a run at F9.

I for one am curious to see how the F9 IPO plays out; Indigo has to be looking at G4 and NK stock soaring and believe that the timing is good.

Today yes, but there were plenty of times when a lot of us were hoping for a merger.

An NK merger would bring with it a non-trivial economy of scale.

It would also attract the non trivial issue of real attention from the Legacies. a 300 odd hull Competitor would be something SW for example would begin taking very serious broadsides against.
Also. Not gonna happen. An IPO is not a for sale sign. It's an offer of equity growth for investors. Indigo are very unlikely to surrender any form of meaningful control.

I agree with the above.

But again, the critical thing that we don't yet know is, how much of the company are they offering up to the public?

If they are only going to offer up 20 or 30%, I think it's safe to assume that they are just raising capital and plan on keeping their hold on the company. But if they IPO a significant chunk of the business, I think it's more likely that they are planning an exit.

They also might just be raising enough capital to pay back loans they took. Im pretty sure Frontier took a couple hundred million in loans from the Gov't in addition to the grant money that didn't have to be paid back. This IPO might be a way for them to pay off those debts workout having to reach into their own pockets.

I don't know if there is a planned merger or acquisition, but this IPO certainly is no guarantee of anything. And lastly, I think the timing is right. Airline stocks are likely to rise sharply during the recovery