CPH-Flyer

Norwegian's transatlantic dreams were based on a travel boom. And even it the hey day of the boom they could not make money. Though one could wonder how things had looked if they had picked GE engines...

Even if travel starts to resume within a couple of months, before there is a boom again that could re kindle Norwegian will be much longer. So yes, it is time for them to ditch long haul, and focus on their short haul operation.

One could say that they have been hit by special circumstances, 787 engines, 737MAX, Pandemic. Could they have avoided the two first, they might have been in a better shape.

itsallgood

The markets are saying that the strings attached to the bulk of the money is a bridge too far.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...s-with-strings

Along with the bond holders having to agree to waiving interest and payments for three months, I think they're required to significantly recapitalize. That means they're going to have to find more investor money. I wouldn't touch airline (or hotel or cruise or rental car or any travel related) stocks right now. I suppose someone will buy a bunch of Norwegian stock, but it's a falling knife.

iahphx

Interesting. Norwegian has been like a cat with 9 lives, but maybe this will actually be the end. It seems cruel, but maybe it's for the best. I am all for saving viable airlines -- and their jobs -- but there has been no evidence for years that Norwegian is viable even in good economic times. Pumping money into a business that is going to fail anyway just seems stupid.

I suspect there is almost no one thinking of buying a future date airline ticket on Norwegian right now but, if for some reason you are, I would strongly recommend not doing so.

USA_flyer

To be fair, they had started to turn it around.

iahphx

Well, the new CEO had certainly taken some steps to stem the bleeding. No evidence of a profitable turnaround, though. I did previously think they would at least make it through summer. Now, of course, there's no way of knowing, but the odds of transatlantic service resuming seem fairly low.

USA_flyer

I would be reluctant to book them under any circumstances as they are known to be in financial difficulty and most travel insurance policies won't cover repatriation if they go belly up.

Dsm2m2

Curious - when you cancelled, did you receive any email after doing so? I cancelled a Premium Flex ticket approx. 24 hours ago and never received anything. Additionally, the screen after cancelling just stated "you reservation has been cancelled" with no additional info.

If I search for the booking, it now comes up as invalid (I can still download a receipt however).

Wondering if this is standard for Norwegian or if I am missing something.

iahphx

So maybe Norwegian is now a cat with 10 lives?

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/n...cted-f8mwkd5d2

I'm still skeptical we'll see transatlantic service resume but, if it doesn't, what does Norwegian do with those planes? This seems like an impossible business situation to manage under the circumstances.

rove312

On March 12 I cancelled a trip I booked for others; as said upthread, I was nominally declining the change of Bay Area departure airports, but it was an hour before DY cancelled service to Italy for those dates. I got an email with an incident number and
At what point does it seem reasonable to approach the credit card issuer (Chase in the U.S.) about a chargeback?

GUWonder

What’s a cat with wings?

Norwegian is a cat with fewer lives than the big US birds which are the massively government-supported, repeatedly bailed-out US airlines.

The US3 airlines don’t need to really worry about Norwegian getting this Norwegian bail-out, as the American gravy train for US bird flyers and owners doesn’t even come with peanuts for Norwegian.

iahphx

I would not say the US airlines are "repeatedly bailed out." Unless you want to argue that 2001 and 2020 -- both insane events, especially 2020 -- means "repeatedly." The reality is that the US airline industry had become remarkably healthy. They can take these loans and get back on their feet (as I understand it, the real bailout is to the employees, who will get paid instead of placed on furlough and unemployment comp -- a questionable government decision to put it mildly). If you have a problem with airlines receiving gov't loans during this crisis, I think you have a very narrow view of government's role in society.

Norwegian, on the other hand, has been a speculative venture for years. A speculative venture that was failing. If the Scandinavian goverments want to give them some money so they can continue service in Europe, that would be a questionable-but-plausible decision. But to fund their money-losing transatlantic operation? Would YOU spend gov't money on that?

Obviously, there is some minor benefit to the remaining airlines to see Norwegian disappear from the transatlantic market. This was inevitable anyway -- it will now occur sooner. In the grand scheme of things going on now, though, it's a trivial benefit.

GUWonder

The US bankruptcy rules have been part of the repeated US bailouts given to the US3 airlines and which have benefited those airlines. Using 9/11 is just an excuse, as the US airlines were a mess before too.

iahphx

You can certainly argue that, historically, US airlines have benefited from US bankruptcy law to an extent that, say, European airlines can't benefit. But the world has now changed and the consolidated US airline industry is -- by far -- the healthiest and most profitable in the world. That's just reality. I'm not even sure they "need" government assistance now to avoid bankruptcy: it's currently hard to say given the unpredictable nature of the virus and the unknown date when travellers will return to the sky. After this virus threat passes, it is almost 100% certain that the US airline industry will again be the healthiest in the world.

GUWonder

What’s way more uncouth than Norway bailing out Norwegian? The US3 airlines demanding bailout money by holding a gun to the head of US employees’ financial well-being as a negotiating tactic (for another bail-out from American taxpayers in the main), and doing this after years of fleecing American consumers and generating cartel kingpin profits on the way. The US3 have had so many recent fat years — by being extensively coddled by the US government in so many ways — that US3’s panhandling ways now just speak to the fundamental greed and irresponsibility of the US3 airline management teams and the shareholders of those airlines.

A government-coddled US airline that can’t float on its own during a massively bad rainy day even after many recent years of generating massive profits? They seem to be at least as deserving of a Social Economic Darwin Award as an airline like Norwegian.

Concerto

I don't know a huge amount about it, apart from what I read here and in the press, so no real expert. But I thought American Airlines was apparently teetering on the edge a bit. I always had the impression that the US carriers were forever living close the abyss, but somehow doing a good job of staying back from the edge. Until now.