In the past week, low-cost carrier JetBlue Airways JBLU gave a bullish outlook for the third quarter of 2024, mainly owing to an improvement in the booking scenario. Southwest Airlines’ LUV former CEO, current executive chair Gary Kelly and several board members announced their decision to step down, thereby yielding to continuous calls for a strategic overhaul from activist investor Elliott Investment Management.

American Airlines AAL will cease to be a member of the S&P 500 from Sept. 23. Driven by high passenger volumes, Copa Holdings CPA reported an increase in revenue passenger miles (a measure of traffic) on a year-over-year basis for August. A traffic-related update is also available in the previous week’s write-up.

Joby Aviation JOBY has applied to become a certified air taxi operator in the United Arab Emirates.

Recap of the Recent Most Important Stories

1 JetBlue now anticipates its third-quarter revenues to either decrease up to 2.5% or increase up to 1% on a year-over-year basis. This marks an improvement from the previous guidance of a decline in the range of 1.5-5.5%. The improvement in the revenue guidance was owing to higher in-month bookings (especially in the Latin region) and continued progress from the previously announced $300 million worth of revenue initiatives.

JBLU now expects its third-quarter capacity (measured in available seat miles) to decline in the 3-5% range. This marks an improvement over the prior forecast of a decline in the 3-6% band.

JBLU currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here

2. Per a regulatory filing, LUV announced that six of its board members are set to retire following the current-year board meeting (currently scheduled for Nov. 21, 2024). Additionally, chairman Gary Kelly announced his decision to “voluntarily retire” from his position following the airline’s annual meeting in 2025. Southwest Airlines CEO Bob Jordan appears to have saved his job for now as the board reiterated its support for him.

The airline presented the changes to the hedge fund and invited it to be part of the company’s turnaround. LUV intends to name four new independent directors going forward.

3. In August, Copa Holdings reported a 5.8% increase in revenue passenger miles. Available seat miles (a measure of capacity) increased 8.2% year over year. With traffic growth being outpaced by capacity increase, the load factor (percentage of seats filled by passengers) decreased to 85.1% from 87% in August 2023.

4. American Airlines will exit the S&P 500 on Sept. 23 and be part of the S&P MidCap 400 index. The change is part of the S&P 500 index’s quarterly adjustment process and reflects AAL’s overall loss of market capitalization over time. AAL's market capitalization, as of Sept. 11, 2024, was $7.22 billion, down drastically from around $37 billion in December 2014. AAL shares have declined 64% over the past five years.