I was done for the year. Oh sure, I have the usual year-end posts, but I was ready to take a break. Then Spirit’s November data dropped, and I couldn’t just ignore that, could I? After all, who knows if it would even be worth talking about if we waited until the new year. So, let’s talk through it while you pretend to work today.
There are two really important things to know about November before we get into this. First, the government shutdown was bad news for airlines. Most airlines put out revised guidance that talked about the impact on a quarterly basis. But for Spirit in the throes of bankruptcy? We don’t really know.
And second, November was our first look at the new, slimmed-down Spirit. Remember this chart I posted last month?
Spirit Daily Scheduled ASMs
Data via Cirium
What this means is that November should have been our first look at whether Spirit was going to have a functioning airline buried in its bloated former self, but the shutdown has clouded that data somewhat. December will be our first real look.
Cash continued to leave the airline’s coffers quickly. Unrestricted cash dropped from just shy of $645 million to just over $586 million. That’s a lot of cash walking out the door in one month.
Unsurprisingly, November was bad on the income statement as well. It reported a loss of $72.7 million on revenues of just $239 million for a net margin of -30.4 percent.
This is better than the -35.6 percent margin in October, but that’s only without context. See, November saw available seat miles (ASMs) drop 19.5 percent. Unit revenues did climb from 9.13 cents to 10.00 cents. But if you cut 20 percent of your flights, and you can’t even boost unit revenue by more than 10 percent? That doesn’t seem like a good trade.
To be fair, there is still a lot more work to be done on the cost side. Things are starting to fall out quickly now with aircraft rent being cut in half by about $25 million, landing fees off more than 20 percent, and distribution down more than 18 percent. But wages are down slightly less than seven percent. More of that should come out over time as the incredible shrinking airline continues to… shrink.
The problem is that the math just doesn’t really work here. Revenues need to keep climbing significantly while costs must plunge.
Let’s pretend wages were cut in half next month which would save about $50 million. That’s ridiculously unrealistic, but then you still have an airline with a -10 percent margin. See what I mean? You still need a very healthy revenue increase of almost 10 percent to break even.
I am really interested in seeing what happens in December, but it’s still bound to be a money-loser. If good progress can’t be made soon, then things will get very hairy.
And now, enough of this. Merry Christmas to all who celebrate. Now go back to pretending you’re doing work.
