December 29, 2011 11:42 pm
AMR to be removed from NYSE
By Jeremy Lemer in New York

Shares in AMR, the bankrupt parent company of American Airlines, will be removed from the New York Stock Exchange from the first week in January, after more than 70 years of trading on the bourse.
On Thursday night, NYSE said that the company was “no longer suitable for listing” because AMR’s shares had fallen below the exchange’s minimum requirements. Its average closing price has fallen below $1.00 for more than 30 days.
The widely expected decision comes after AMR filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection at the end of November. At the time AMR blamed the move on adverse economic conditions and overly burdensome labour costs.
In an interview with the Financial Times, Tom Horton, the new chief executive, said that the company had “fought the good fight,” avoiding bankruptcy in 2003 even as its peers used court restructuring to cut costs, but argued AMR had no alternatives.
AMR has said it will use Chapter 11 to reduce its costs, restructure its network and force concessions from its unions and suppliers. Already the company has torn up contracts for some of its older, fuel inefficient aircraft.
In after-market trading on Thursday the shares tumbled about 40 per cent to $0.32.
The effective delisting represents a sad milestone for AMR, which first traded on the NYSE in June 1939. By 2004, when AMR executives rang the closing bell to mark the 65th anniversary of its listing, the company boasted that it was the “world’s largest carrier”.
Seven years on American has slipped down the global rankings as its rivals have merged with one another to form powerful new global competitors that have managed to squeeze out modest profits even as AMR has continued to lose money.
Even if AMR successfully emerges from bankruptcy, analysts expect equity investors to be wiped out during the court supervised restructuring processes, as bondholders typically have the first call on any assets. In its bankruptcy filing AMR said it had assets of about $25bn and liabilities of about $30bn.
AMR said on its website that it had not opposed the NYSE’s move to suspend its shares and said that “it remains too early to determine whether holders of such securities will receive any distribution in the Chapter 11 reorganisation”.
AMR said that investors would likely be able to continue to trade its securities using the OTC Bulletin Board and Pink Sheets Electronic Quotation Service. But AMR warned that trading securities in bankrupt companies was “highly speculative” and that investors could find it hard to sell the new securities quickly if at all.