canyonblue
Everyone loves Southwest
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- Nov 26, 2001
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Southwest Holds the Line
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By TSC Staff
4/20/2006 7:02 AM EDT
Southwest Airlines beat first-quarter targets Thursday despite a 10% rise in unit costs, driven by sky-high fuel prices.
The Dallas-based airline made $61 million, or 7 cents a share, compared with $59 million, or 7 cents a share, a year earlier. Excluding hedging losses and gains, earnings rose to 8 cents from 5 cents a year earlier, beating the Thomson Financial estimate by a penny. Sales rose 21% from a year ago to $2.02 billion, beating the $1.96 billion estimate.
"Demand for our low fares and high quality customer service was strong, resulting in a record first quarter load factor of 69.2%, up 3.8 points from first quarter 2005," said CEO Gary Kelly. "Thus far, strong load factor and revenue trends have continued in April, and Customer bookings for the remainder of second quarter 2006 are strong.
"We continued to maintain low fare leadership in America, increasing yields simply to offset ever-higher jet fuel prices. Passenger revenue yields per mile increased 5.4% in first quarter 2006 versus the year ago period."
http://www.thestreet.com/tsc/c.gif
By TSC Staff
4/20/2006 7:02 AM EDT
Southwest Airlines beat first-quarter targets Thursday despite a 10% rise in unit costs, driven by sky-high fuel prices.
The Dallas-based airline made $61 million, or 7 cents a share, compared with $59 million, or 7 cents a share, a year earlier. Excluding hedging losses and gains, earnings rose to 8 cents from 5 cents a year earlier, beating the Thomson Financial estimate by a penny. Sales rose 21% from a year ago to $2.02 billion, beating the $1.96 billion estimate.
"Demand for our low fares and high quality customer service was strong, resulting in a record first quarter load factor of 69.2%, up 3.8 points from first quarter 2005," said CEO Gary Kelly. "Thus far, strong load factor and revenue trends have continued in April, and Customer bookings for the remainder of second quarter 2006 are strong.
"We continued to maintain low fare leadership in America, increasing yields simply to offset ever-higher jet fuel prices. Passenger revenue yields per mile increased 5.4% in first quarter 2006 versus the year ago period."
