Worldspan Sold

[KC tirechanger]

Well people, What about that tax break money I heard about aweek or so age? Or was that just rummor too? I hear it was a good chunk of change! Oh! Do you think the worldspan sail story will be on jetnet???

 

[FA Mikey]

AA is reportedly getting a 550 million dollar tax refund.

 

[KC tirechanger]

Well,let's see now! $550 mill., plus whatever they get from Worldspan. Do you think they'll subtract that from what they want from us? Not!!! Somehow it seems I've been down this road before!

 

[JFK777]

TWA was about ST.Louis, only a little but about San Juan and slots at DCA, LGA, and JFK. San Juan was successful for TWA but it was never going to match AA's service to all those Caribbean points with nonstop flights from JFk, BOS, MIA and other east coast cities. The attraction if St. Louis to match the geography of ORD & DFW is self evident. STL is about expansion at AA, the market will recover and TWA and its STL employees will be part of that exciting future.

 

[WingNaPrayer]

[blockquote]
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On 3/6/2003 9:16:09 AM KC tirechanger wrote:

Well,let's see now! $550 mill., plus whatever they get from Worldspan. Do you think they'll subtract that from what they want from us? Not!!! Somehow it seems I've been down this road before!
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[/blockquote]

Of course not. What they are getting here (tax and sale) are one time things. What they want from employees is permanent and continuous.

 

[kirkpatrick]

[blockquote]
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On 3/6/2003 9:25:47 AM JFK777 wrote:

STL is about expansion at AA, the market will recover and TWA and its STL employees will be part of that exciting future.
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[/blockquote]

Finally something I can agree with. It'll take a little while, though.

MK

 

[FWAAA]

[blockquote]
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On 3/5/2003 12:37:55 PM Red Forman wrote:

And if AMR hadn't pissed away $1B+ on TWA all 21000 would be looking elsewhere for work and AMR would still be sitting on $3.5B with a Ch. 11 filing much less likely.
No emotion---just some cold, hard facts.
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[/blockquote]

Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda.

Had AMR not repurchased $2.5 billion of its own shares during 1997-99, then it would have $2.5 billion more in the bank right now and bankruptcy would be another year away.

Hindsight is such a wonderful tool. I'll bet management wishes more than anything that they still had that $2.5 billion. Some probably even curse the directors who thought share buybacks were a good idea. I know I curse the supporters of the buybacks each and every day.

Problem is, had the buybacks not happened, the employees would be claiming that the cash burn wasn't really all that dire and that concessions could wait.

Don't put off til tomorrow what you should have done years ago.

Since buying TWA, AA has only laid out about $1 billion in cash. How much time would that really buy once we go to war and oil skyrockets and high-yield travel completely dries up??