Mar 31, 2017

Frontier Airlines files for IPO

Dan Primack

David Zalubowski

Low-cost airline Frontier today filed for an initial public offering, which means it likely plans to go public sometime in May. The Denver-based company last year flew 14.9 million passengers through 59 airports in the U.S., Mexico and the Caribbean.

Top line: The Denver-based carrier's income statement reflects its budget sensibilities, with $200 million in net income on $1.7 billion in revenue. This is up from $146 million of earnings on $1.37 billion in revenue in 2015.

Why the improvement? Three factors jump out. First, the average cost of fuel fell from $1.90 per gallon to $1.59 per gallon. Second, the average number of passengers per departure climbed from 154 to 173. then there is "non-ticket revenue" (i.e., booking fees, baggage fees, on-flight purchases), which jumped from $401 million to $726 million.

Market: Airline stocks have been major beneficiaries of the "Trump Bump," judging by the most popular airline ETFs. Budget airline rival Southwest recently hit an all-time high, while Spirit Air remains well below its 2004 highs (but still is up for the past year).

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U.S. coronavirus updates: White House studies models projecting virus peak

Data: The Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins; Map: Andrew Witherspoon/Axios

The White House and other institutions are observing several models to better understand and prepare cities for when the coronavirus is expected to peak in the U.S.

The state of play: The coronavirus is expected to peak in the U.S. in two weeks, but many states like Virginia and Maryland will see their individual peaks well after that, according to a model by the University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.

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FDA authorizes two-minute antibody testing kit to detect coronavirus

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Why it matters: Access to testing has improved in the U.S. thanks to commercial labs, but the average wait time for a patient's results is four to five days — with some reports of it taking more than a week.

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