By the way they also announced today their first major cuts ever a 6% flying pulldown.
Actually, a 5-6% capacity reduction for the 1st quarter. They're still planning on adding a net of up to 10 new aircraft next year, giving them the flexibility of add back capacity if conditions warrant.
They also have the fastest rising cost and a quickly aging workforce. The 10% a year constant growth hid a lot of that.
AA - Op Exp up 17.9% YoY
CO - Op Exp up 21.7% YoY
DL - Op Exp up 17.1% YoY
WN - Op Exp up 20.0 % YoY
Looks like WN's increase in Op Expenses is in the ballpark with the legacies that have reported so far, plus the legacies' percentage increase is from a higher base - 17% of a bigger number can be more than 20% of a smaller number.
Gee - I never realized that WN employees aged faster than legacy employees!! Seriously though, I understand what you're getting at. A reduction or even halt in hiring at WN means that the average age of their employees goes up faster than when they're constantly hiring for growth. Wonder what effect furloughing has on the average age of the employees at the legacies...
Their credit was just reduced from AAA to BBB+ (Still the best in the airline biz).
"Still the best in the airline biz" covers that subject nicely.
So while they are the best run airline they are not immune from market forces
Correct, and I doubt that they've ever said that they are immune. Good management just allows them the luxury of being better prepared to weather changing market forces. Take fuel hedges as just one example - WN knows what they'll be paying at most for 75% of their fuel next year. They've made fuel a largely fixed cost that can be planned for. Should fuel prices drop below their hedged price, they're still ahead. The legacies, that far ahead, are largely guessing what fuel cost will be when they set prices. Fuel is still a largely variable cost for them so they can only set prices and hope for the best.
Jim