PlaneBusiness Banter Now Posted!

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Good evening everyone!

The first issue of PlaneBusiness Banter for 2013 is now posted. And yours truly is sick as a dog. As a result, it’s going to be a short summary tonight.

I am desperately in need of more tea, more medicine, more chicken soup, and more sleep. Bleech.

However, before I crawl away and climb under the covers, here’s a peek at what we are talking about in this week’s issue.

Taking the top spot of course are the problems with the Boeing 787. The week began with a fire on a Japan Airlines 787 in Boston, and it’s pretty much continued to go downhill ever since. I think it would be safe to say it’s not been a good week for our friends at Boeing.

Since we did just end both a year and a quarter, we have all kinds of airline stock charts for you to peruse this week. Taking the top spot for performance in 2012 were shares of US Airways. The shares picked up a cool 166% for the year.

On the American/US Airways front, we expect we should hear something formal in terms of a merger agreement before the end of the month. My bet is the announcement is made before US Airways releases its earnings. Stay tuned.

This week we talk a lot about Southwest Airlines. Taking the cue from analyst Bob McAdoo from Imperial Capital, we revisit the information the airline released at its recent investor day in December — and we note the airline has already been forced to backpedal on some of its announced increases in fees it made that day.

Like I say, we talk a long time this week about the airline. And not a lot of it is overly enthusiastic.

We also bring you a super secret list of New Year’s resolutions. That’s right. We have the New Year’s resolutions from a number of airline CEOs — both current and past.
As for the AMR Bankruptcy Follies — this week we dissect the “Bob Crandall” video that had so many people talking while we were on Holiday Hiatus.

An American Airlines‘ exec leaves to become CEO of Virgin Atlantic, we give you a look at the messages several airline CEOs sent to their employees at the end of the year, and we even update you on Pinnacle, which, as everyone had assumed, is going to exit bankruptcy as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Delta Air Lines.

All this and more (cough, cough) in this week’s issue of PlaneBusiness Banter.