Analysts positive on American Airlines, United Continental, Delta and Alaska
American Airlines (+0.2%) made a slight gain in a day of mixed trading for North and South American airline stocks on Friday (10-Dec-2010). American's rise came following comments from Barclays the day before that the carrier has provided "encouraging" 4Q2010 mainline RASM guidance, in excess of what it had been expecting. AMR expects 4Q2010 mainline RASM to rise around 7% year-on-year, compared with Barclay's estimate of 4.8%.
As a result, the analysts stated American Airlines remains one of its top picks, believing the carrier's margin improvement should exceed the industry average in 2011. Barclay's maintained an "overweight" rating on the carrier.
American, United Continental, Delta 'research tactical ideas'
Morgan Stanley named American Airlines, United Continental (-0.2%) and Delta Air Lines (-2.2%) "research tactical ideas". Morgan Stanley analyst William Greene stated the older airlines, as compared with JetBlue (+0.6%) and Southwest Airlines (+0.4%), have been sold off recently on concerns of rising fuel prices. Delta was the biggest decliner of the day. But Mr Greene stated the carrier's investors day and guidance updates this week may boost these carriers' stock prices.
See related CAPA Profile: Outlook, Forecasts, Guidance
Investors eye Alaska Air
Alaska Air (+1.0%) and Allegiant (+1.0%) made the biggest progress for the session, with Alaska rising to a 52 week high. According, to TradersHuddle.com, investors are now monitoring the carrier's stock price to see if its gain results in further buying. Alaska Air ended trading at USD56.95.
North & South America selected airlines daily share price movements (% change): 10-Dec-2010
Source: Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation & Yahoo! Finance