American Airlines on Thursday posted another big quarterly loss as the coronavirus pandemic hurt summer travel demand, but the carrier trimmed its cash burn.
Revenue dropped 73% in the three months ended Sept. 30 to $3.17 billion from $11.9 billion a year earlier. The carrier swung to a $2.4 billion net loss in the third quarter from a $425 million profit a year earlier. Excluding one-time items, American posted a per-share loss of $5.54, better than analysts expected.
American shares were down 1.4% premarket. The company said it has authorized a stock sale to raise up to $1 billion.
Fort Worth-based American earlier this month began furloughing 19,000 of its employees after the terms of $25 billion federal aid for the struggling airline sector expired. American has been the most vocal about urging lawmakers and the Trump administration to provide another $25 billion in aid for airlines, but so far no deal has been reached.
Here’s how American performed compared with what Wall Street expected, based on average estimates compiled by Refinitiv:
- Adjusted results: a loss of $5.54 versus an expected loss of $5.86.
- Revenue: $3.17 billion versus $2.81 billion, expected.
American trimmed its cash burn to about $44 million a day in the third quarter from $58 million in the previous three-month period. It expects that to go down to $25 million to $30 million a day in the fourth quarter.
American will discuss its results with analysts at 8.30 a.m. ET.
