Virgin America Cuts Airbus Order, Delays 30 Jets

[bri5150]

Despite my history of being a Virgin cheerleader, I will admit this is bad news. My honest opinion is that the board/investors are preparing for a sale or merger. We have all known the intent of the investors was to start and IPO as quickly as possible. This was not a long term plan for them. The market is bad for IPOs and the looming threat of a fiscal cliff has ensured it will not be good for IPOs for a while longer. So the only way for the investors to get a quick return is to sell to another company. How do you make yourself attractive to sell? Reduce your financial obligations as much as possible. With the deferrals VX can offer a decent presence in SFO and LAX and lower long term financial obligations. I doubt we will see VX around in its present form by this time next year. We will either a be a subsidiary of Delta and being slowly absorbed, or you will see us in a two or three way hookup with JetBlue and/or Frontier.

This is a beauty!! I really find this stuff interesting from last year. This post was almost exactly a year ago. I don't post this to prove anyone wrong, but it is just interesting looking at predictions just after the aircraft deferral.

 

[bri5150]

Before I was even hired at VA I thought the history with jetBlue, the east/west route structures, and the similar philosphies made us likely merge partners. I have no inside information whatever, just using my brain for theories. Hawaiian makes sense as well. Bring people in from Asia/Hawaii and our current route structure spreads them througout the country. Again, no inside info, just using my head. There seems to be a lot of Delta rumors for some reason. I have a bad feeling if that happens. They probably just want the planes to replace their old Airbus fleet.

I was pretty down about things too.

 

[bri5150]

I think the best thing LoveGun wrote was the last sentence.

Most of the other points made no sense whatsoever. VA will just stop making interest payments? Rivers of cash flow? You have a great board? (so did Long Term Capital Management!)

Look, you guys had a great ride. You took it out over the ocean. The second bottle just got blown into the engine and the little red lights aren't going out. If you're not at least feeling around for the handles, you're beyond help.

Great one liner at the bottom there!

 

[Tomct]

Funny how UALDriver is not puffing his chest anymore.....IS HE!

 

[ualdriver]

Funny how UALDriver is not puffing his chest anymore.....IS HE!

Dude, I wasn't puffing my chest. Your airline was in a death spiral with significant losses quarter after quarter and the VA cheerleaders were in denial. According to your airline's press release, there was some sort of debt restructuring with your investors (debt for equity?) that made your company's huge interest payments magically decrease by 2/3's. You guys still have a net loss for the 9 months ending 2013. And you made money in a historically strong quarter where EVERYONE is making money lots of money. What happens to VA during the next crisis? The next oil spike? The next recession? The next war? If I was working there, I wouldn't want to be around to find out.

I stand by that quoted statement. If I were a VA pilot, I'd enjoy the financial reprieve but get the he11 out while the getting is good.