flatlander

I expect Norwegian would suffer the same problems as Little Red did: with no alliance or interline agreements, they would be limited to point to point traffic. Traffic from Scotland to Heathrow has a lot of competition: for much of London, Stansted or Gatwick are equally (in) convenient and Easyjet and Ryanair are there already, there are also the trains from Edinburgh and Glasgow for some people, and obviously the very budget coach or driving yourself. The connecting passengers are vital for revenue to such a high-cost airport.

Now, if Norwegian could somehow be a well-organised feeder for the Star Alliance and Skyteam, that might be of interesting - but then, BA already have some of that business and a lot of the rest of the long haul business on Star and Skyteam goes via another European hub. MAN/EDI/NCL/GLA/etc to AMS/FRA/CPH/etc to the world. But it would at least let them support themselves with more than O/D which we know doesn't work well, it's written on Little Red's epitaph.

cornishsimon

Raffles

This sort of thing makes me laugh. Flybe is a quoted company. As there is no controlling shareholder, it has ALWAYS been up for sale - the price is printed in the newspapers every morning. The board may now have agreed not to cause a fuss if someone starts buying up the shares, but they never had any real option if someone wanted to buy it.

IAG is also up for sale - the price is printed in the FT. Same with easyJet, same with Ryanair.

Ironically, the only airline not 'up for sale' is the one that everyone thinks is - Norwegian, where the CEO has an effectively controlling shareholding.

Akoz

I thought EasyJet Switzerland was only 49% owned by Easyjet and the rest owned by Swiss investors?

Akoz

Identical thread regarding Flybe;
Downward trend at flybe

Dan72

But why then is it a story on the BBC's front page and covered in the FT? Both news outlets that publish lots of share prices, including Flybe's. My guess is that these news outlets have significant doubts as to whether they will be publishing Flybe's share price for much longer. The same doubts don't apply to IAG, Easyjet etc. If it did, they'd be on the front page too.

memesweeper

squawk

cornishsimon

squawk

bisonrav

There's a big difference between being quoted on the stock market and the board actively suggesting it is looking for a buyer. They are signalling they are in trouble and need a significant injection of capital, and you would imagine recovery funds will be having a sniff. There's also a difference between just buying shares and taking a company over:

The fact the board would support a takeover or not is important in persuading shareholders to take the offer, which is important to a buyer in calculating the probabilities of success.

Meanwhile I'm looking to spend my flybe free flight voucher pronto.

cornishsimon

simons1

Of course you know in the real world that isn't how the markets operate and there is a complete difference between agreeing "not to cause a fuss" and the board finding a buyer which they recommend to shareholders.

Also very few companies change hands with someone hoovering up shares on the exchange. This is because the biggest shareholders are institutional (I believe over 50% of Flybe is owned by 6/7 funds) who are more likely to await the possible premium in an acquisition.

Sealink

I bet the shareholders are wishing they'd said yes to Stobart now.

allturnleft