Shares of JetBlue Airways Corp. $(JBLU)$ rose 0.5% in premarket trading Tuesday, after the air carrier reported a narrower-than-expected third-quarter loss, revenue that rose four-fold to top forecasts and provided an upbeat outlook.
The company swung to net income of $130 million, or 40 cents a share, from a loss of $393 million, or $1.44 a share, in the year-ago period. Excluding nonrecurring items, which would include government payroll assistance, the adjusted per-share loss was 12 cents, compared with the FactSet loss consensus of 18 cents.
Revenue rose 300.8% to $1.97 billion, topping the FactSet consensus of $1.93 billion, as revenue passengers rose 321.8% to 9.08 million. Load factor increased to 79.9% from 42.6% but came up short of expectations of 82.3%, as capacity rose 134.1% to 16.17 million available seat miles. Departures increased 139.4% to 76,918. "September took the brunt of the bookings softness associated with rising case counts tied to the Delta variant," said Chief Operating Officer Joanna Geraghty. "That said, trends have stabilized and are improving.
We expect robust revenue acceleration throughout the quarter as the holidays approach and demand continues to meaningfully improve." The stock has lost 8.3% over the past three months through Monday, while the U.S. Global Jets ETF $(JETS.UK)$ has slipped 4.3% and the S&P 500 has gained 3.3%.