Brutally Honest, No Sugar Coating, SWA Best Suited and Prepared

[swamt]

Remember a few updates ago our CEO said each week in April got better and better little by little. Now saying even May is continuing that trend too. This is good news. Positive movement starting earlier than what I thought it would. Just remember Southwest, keep up the mandatory mask and/or face coverings, distancing the aircraft passengers (as he stated in this video SWA does not pack in the aircraft) keep up the cleaning and disinfecting, and, as he also said keep checking the passengers and crews temps so no one possibly infected to get onboard. This will get passengers back on our aircraft before the others (except for JetBlue and I think Alaska, who is also mandating mask, distancing, cleaning and temp reading too) with these enforced rules. The big 3 have admittedly all NOT enforcing the mask, distancing and who knows what else.
I think we all know how dire this might get come Oct IF the passenger flying does not pick up by then. I also think SWA can charge the lowest pricing to entice customers back in the air. 14 Billion in the bank when we normally have 3-4 billion on hand. Still enough to carry us over a year at current spending and cost rate. Here's to hope that the flying really starts to pick up going forward. Maybe Southwest could start a huge fare sale to help build up that boost for the coming summer months...

https://www.yahoo.com/news/southwest-ceo-radical-restructuring-coming-161546366.html

https://www.yahoo.com/finance/video/southwest-air-beginning-see-traffic-160258327.html

https://www.yahoo.com/news/airline-industry-not-likely-recover-042727105.html

 

[swamt]

Well, this article is very encouraging in many ways. First and foremost, "hopefully" we will get the Max back in the air so to retire some of our older less efficient aircraft compared to the Max.
Also liked hearing about the increases in flight bookings over cancellations and getting better and better each month going forward.
And now SWA has saved, and moved monies around to have 13 billion on hand which is approx 10 billion more than regularly cash on hand. He also states that this will carry us 20 months as is. That's almost 2 years. If we can get more employees to take the leaves and the Early Outs when offered this may even get better for a longer survival as we continue to save more and more each and every month. I did read at some time SWA is looking to get down to 10 million per month burn on the cash reserves. If and when that is met I see more like 2.5 years to 3 years stretched into the factors.
So please, I would like to encourage any SWA employees that are able to take the Early Outs, extended ETO's, or any of the optional leaves for at least now thru August to try and do so. Never put yourself or your family in too much of a pinch but at least try to do what ya can and maybe at SWA we will recover from this without a single involuntary furlough or layoffs. It's all just temporary and the final results in the long run will probably be much better than just waiting until Oct. and just hoping everything will be ok. Prayers for all and hope all who can will step up and do what they can. Thanks and please be safe and stay healthy to all...

https://www.yahoo.com/news/southwest-ceo-boeing-737-max-170346755.html

 

[eolesen]

I have to wonder how much of that is actually cash, and how much came from lines of credit that need to be paid back or sale-leasebacks on aircraft or other assets.

 

[swamt]

It's all cash. He went into much more detail on his video to the employees where it all came from. Although SWA doesn't have hardly any leased aircraft we did have a few that were leased back back in March. They also saved tons on a huge building they use to lease for office space, off headquarters property, that was mostly used by contractors and temp workers as well as some other workers that were all able to work from home, contracts were up and/or temp workers jobs came to an end at end of school and college work programs. A many of renovations were halted by a bunch of offices as they no longer was in need of more square footage because people are taking full advantage of working from home and that saves SWA tons of money. Going forward I assure you we will all see many more companies continue to use employees to work at home in the future after C-19.
We normally keep 3-4 Billion in cash reserves on hand. He has said he would like to see 12-18 Billion to get thru the C-19 crisis.

 

[swamt]

Speaking of being better prepared here is an article with a video that really compares the airlines and how they could or could not recover from this if it goes any longer past Sept.
A risk assessment charting if ya will. Who might be at most risk of BK or even possible failure...

https://www.yahoo.com/news/american-airlines-traffic-hits-coronavirus-164433190.html

 

[eolesen]

$815m was from selling owned airplanes and $2B was by issuing bonds. $2B was from stock sales.

So yeah, they raised close to $5B in cash. $2.8B of that is borrowed, though, and does have to be paid back.