Etihad European Investment Strategy Goes Horribly Wrong

Even more interesting is the state of affairs at Alitalia. When I was at Texaco in the early 1990's, we were instructed not to book business travel on Alitalia because it was probably going to go under at any moment. The financials gave Alitalia no chance of survival. Well, here we are almost 30 years later and Etihad and the Italian government are in crisis talks to try and save Alitalia.

Alitalia has never made much effort to economize or tighten their belts because they've always assumed that the Italian government would provide them a cash infusion whenever needed. And, the Italian government has done so. They don't want to be the only country in western Europe that doesn't have a national airline. National pride outweighs national finances every time.