Delta Air Lines Sees Strong Q4, Despite Election Bumps

Delta Air Lines is looking ahead to a promising fourth quarter. The airline expects to make more money than last year, thanks to steady travel demand and lots of bookings for the holiday season. On Thursday, it said its adjusted earnings per share for the fourth quarter might be between $1. 60 and $1. 85. That's higher than what analysts estimated and also better than last year's $1. 28. Despite the good news, Delta's stock took a dip in early trading, falling over 5%. The airline thinks its revenue might go up by 2% to 4% compared to last year. But it warned that the upcoming U. S. presidential election on November 5 might cause a small drop in travel demand before and after the vote. CEO Ed Bastian explained that people often pause their travel plans around big elections. But he also said that bookings for the holidays are looking very strong. In the third quarter that just ended, Delta's earnings per share were $1. 50, a bit less than what analysts expected. The airline brought in $14. 59 billion in revenue, also a bit below expectations. A big issue was a computer outage in July, caused by CrowdStrike. This cost Delta $380 million in revenue and cut 45 cents from its adjusted earnings per share. The airline is trying to get compensation for this from CrowdStrike and Microsoft. Even with this setback, Delta's net income rose to $1. 27 billion, up 15% from a year ago. Its total revenue was $15. 68 billion, a 1% increase. The airline said that sales from premium seats, like first class, were doing better than regular seats. Delta thinks the air travel market in the U. S. is stabilizing. This means they can charge more for tickets. The airline plans to fly more in the fourth quarter, with a 3% to 4% increase in capacity. For the full year, Delta still expects its adjusted earnings to be between $6 and $7 per share, not counting the impact of the CrowdStrike outage.