<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by B747-437B:
Baby steps in the right direction helped UAL slightly in Q2, but there is still an uphill climb to recovery. Yield showed surprising improvement to 11.36, as did load factor to 74.4%. However, breakeven is still out of reach at 87%. Operating margins improved slightly, but still runs almost -13%. CASM was down fractionally over Q1, but is still higher year-on-year. The once proud cash position has been eroded to the point of almost vulnerability, and debt is also beginning to mount. Rono continues to focus on the traditional yield-driven revenue model rather than adopt the changes made by DAL and NWAC. The jury is out on whether this will work in the long run or not, but in the short term the focus must be on CASM reductions. So far its been too little, and I hope for UAL's sake that it doesn't get too late.</font>
The most interesting part of the Q2 call was when Buttrick (I believe) asked why UA was having trouble refinancing their $900M dedt due later this year. Was it a problem that the interest rates being asked were too high? Or whether people were not willing to lend the money to UA? When told that it was the latter case, Buttrick asked "Why do you think that is happening?"
One thing I did like was the statement that are trying to separate out the services for low-fare buckets vs. the higher-fare buckets.
[This message has been edited by abigail (edited 07-22-2002).]