Continental Airlines became the third major airline to report second quarter earnings this week, as the airline reported it lost $3 million, or 3 cents a share, compared with a profit of $228 million, or $2.03 a share, a year ago.

Excluding $22 million in one-time gains, the carrier lost $25 million, or 25 cents a share for the quarter.

Revenues came in basically on target, and were up 9% for the quarter. Analysts had been expecting the airline to post a loss of 49 cents a share, so the airline’s loss was much much better than had been expected.

Continental said it ended the second quarter with about $3.4 billion in unrestricted cash and short-term investments. It expects that figure to fall to $2.8 billion by the end of the third quarter.

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