American Airlines Group, the world’s largest carrier, said yesterday its third-quarter profit jumped, beating analysts’ expectations.
American reported net income of $1.7bn in the quarter, up 80% from a year ago as the price of oil has plummeted. It earned $1.9bn, excluding charges, or $2.77 per diluted share. On that basis, the average analyst estimate was $2.72 per share, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
The company said it would buy back another $2bn of its stock.
Shares rose 3.8% to $47.75 in premarket trading, even as American reported that passenger unit revenue, or sales at the airline relative to the total mileage of the seats it flies, declined 6.8% from a year ago. The earnings report comes about a week after American finished transferring thousands of customer reservations from the computer platform of subsidiary US Airways to the one used by American.
On Friday, the company said the reservations “cutover” was successful, reporting “no operational impact” in a process that had led to widespread delays at rival United Continental Holdings.
American and US Airways merged in 2013. On October 17, the US Airways website and brand disappeared, with all the company’s flights now operating as American Airlines. The company said the pretax profit margin was 17.7% in the quarter, excluding special items, which was on the high end of its prior forecast of 17% to 18%.