Buy Airline Stocks Now Says Ranked Equity Analyst
November 23, 2009 - The Wall Street Transcript has just published Travel and Leisure--Airlines, Hotels, Resorts, Cruise Lines, and Restaurants Report offering a timely review of the Airlines sector. This Special Report contains expert industry commentary through in-depth interviews with public company CEOs, Equity Analysts and Money Managers. Please find an excerpt below.
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HELANE BECKER is a Managing Director at Jesup & Lamont who covers the transportation industry, focusing on airlines, air freight and freight forwarding. Ms. Becker has more than 25 years of experience in the financial industry, holding positions within research, trading and investment banking departments. Prior to joining Jesup & Lamont, she was Managing Director at CapStone Investments and helped to raise capital for small- to mid-cap companies.
She also previously held positions at Smith Barney, Lehman Brothers and several other broker-dealers as a Senior Transportation Analyst. Ms. Becker was ranked first, second or third from 1985 to 1993 by Institutional Investor magazine. She was also ranked in the top five by the Wall Street Journal in 1992, 1993, 1997, 2001 and 2002 as one of the best analysts on the Street. Ms. Becker holds a B.A. from Montclair State University and an MBA from New York University. She is a member of several organizations, including Who's Who Among Women in Business, and she is a former President of The Society of Airline Analysts.
TWST: Let's start with your overall outlook for the airline industry today. What is your outlook and why?
Ms. Becker: We think that the airlines have seen the bottom or are in the process of bottoming, and our outlook for the third quarter is for an aggregate total of about 30 billion in revenue, and operating profit of about 600 million and a net loss of about 400 million. Obviously, all numbers exclude non-recurring gains, charges and mark-to-market hedge-related gains and losses. The revenue estimate is for a decline of about 8%. That compares to our initial estimate earlier in the year that revenues would be down between 7% and 9%. I think that the fourth quarter should show a little bit of improvement versus the third quarter and versus last year. We're thinking the fourth quarter will be low single digits, so down 3% to 7%. And then 2010 we think will be better.
TWST: So perhaps the worst is behind us?
Ms. Becker: We think the worst is behind us.
TWST: I'm sure you saw these statistics too, but I read recently that globally the airline industry is expected to lose 11 billion this year and another 3.8 billion in 2010. How much of that is attributable to the U.S. airline industry?
Ms. Becker: I think that most of that is attributable to airlines outside the United States. The U.S. is far ahead of the rest of the world in terms of capacity reductions and adjustments to declines in traffic. Of the 11 billion decline that IATA is estimating, which is the number that you just cited, probably about 3.5 billion to 4 billion is related to the United States; the rest is outside the U.S. And the reason for that is the U.S. airlines were very quick to cut capacity when fuel prices were going up and the rest of the world did not. The rest of the major airlines, like British Airways (BAY) and Lufthansa (LHA), Air France-KLM (AFLYY), Japan Airline (JALSY), waited a very long time before they moved the needle on capacity. And so the U.S. airlines had about a one-year head start, and the result was that when traffic turned down, it didn't look quite as bad for the U.S. airlines as it did for the peer group.
Note: Opinions and recommendations are as of 10/07/09.
HELANE BECKER
Jesup & Lamont
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