Delta Air Lines travel rebound due to vaccination exceeds revenue expectations Reuters

(Reuters)-Delta Air Lines (NYSE:) announced quarterly revenue on Wednesday that was higher than expected, and said it expects to remain profitable for the rest of the fiscal year, as travel demand rebounds and international markets are fast Reopened with the support of vaccination.

Delta Air Lines stated that its business volume continued to improve in the second quarter due to increased demand in business-intensive markets such as New York and Boston, and added that it resumed profitability in June.

“The days of burning money are over,” said Ed Bastian, the chief executive of Delta Air Lines.

“Domestic leisure tourism has fully recovered to the level of 2019, and business and international tourism have shown encouraging signs of improvement.”

As people tired of the pandemic begin to travel, American Airlines is looking to hire more pilots and staff to push passenger traffic to the highest level since the COVID-19 crisis sharply reduced demand in March 2020.

Delta Air Lines said it expects adjusted operating income for the September quarter to increase by 30% to 35% over two years ago, with a midpoint of 8.47 billion U.S. dollars, higher than the 8.23 ​​billion U.S. dollars estimated by Refinitiv-IBES.

This will be a significant improvement from the 60.4% decline in operating income in the first quarter.

Delta’s adjusted operating income in the second quarter fell 49% from 2019 to US$6.35 billion, but it was higher than the average analyst estimate of US$6.22 billion.

In the three months ended June 30, net income fell from $1.44 billion or $2.21 per share a year ago to $652 million or $1.02 per share.

Excluding items, the company lost $1.07 per share in the second quarter.