JetBlue's (JBLU) Traffic & Load Factor Increase In April

JetBlue Airways Corporation (NASDAQ:JBLU) posted a rise in traffic figures for April. Traffic — measured in revenue passenger miles (RPMs) — improved 5.7% year over year to 4.3 billion. On a year-over-year basis, consolidated capacity (or available seat miles/ASMs) expanded 5.3% to 5.02 billion.

Load factor or percentage of seats filled by passengers increased 40 basis points (bps) to 85.7% in the month as traffic growth outpaced capacity expansion.

This Long Island City, NY-based low-cost carrier registered a completion factor (system wide) of 98.7% in the month with 67.6% flights on schedule.

In the first four months of the year, the carrier posted a 4.5% rise in RPMs while ASMs rose 3.8%, both on a year-over-year basis. Load factor improved 60 bps year over year to 84.9%.

JetBlue maintains its projection for revenues per available seat mile (RASM) in the second quarter of 2018 in the range of a decline of 3% to flat year over year. This downside is due to adverse effects pertaining to holiday placement, completion factor as well as co-brand incentive payments. In the year-ago quarter the metric rose 7% year over year.

Zacks Rank & Key Picks

JetBlue carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). Some better-ranked stocks in the airline space are SkyWest, Inc. (NASDAQ:SKYW) , Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd. (OTC:CPCAY) and Swire Pacific Ltd. (OTC:SWRAY) . While SkyWest sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), Cathay Pacific Airways and Swire Pacific carry a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Shares of SkyWest, Cathay Pacific Airways and Swire Pacific have gained more than 57%, 17% and 3%, respectively, in a year.

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