Delta Air Lines, Inc. (NYSE:DAL) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Glen Hauenstein : Well, I think what we have left to go in the year is we have to get through Labor Day, of course, and I think we have good visibility through Labor Day. Then we have October, which is historically a very strong travel month for business. So we’ll see how that unfolds. And then we have the holidays, which are the peak holidays. That’s all that’s really left in the year, and we have good bookings for the holidays. We have good visibility on that. So it’s really going to depend on — and I think it’s potential upside, as you said earlier, it does business travel more, return more than we expect. And if so, then we have some good upside for the back half of the year. If not, we’re going to trend where we see today.

Julie Stewart : We’ll wrap up the analyst portion of the call. I’ll now turn it over to Tim Mapes to start the media questions.

Tim Mapes : Thank you, Julie. Matthew, if you would please just remind the members of the media about queuing up for the call? And we’ll jump in with members of the media.

Operator: [Operator Instructions] Your first question is coming from Alison Sider from Wall Street Journal.

Alison Sider : I wanted to ask about — Viasat yesterday reported it had a deployment issue with its recently launched satellite. Just curious if that causes any potential problems for Delta’s free WiFi plans, either for the current — what’s currently in place or the future rollouts and if you have to consider any kind of alternatives?

Ed Bastian : Obviously, we were disappointed as Viasat was with the news yesterday, but we’re committed long term and they will get through this. We see no meaningful impact to our — to where we stand currently with our domestic capacity, and we’re working closely with them to make sure the domestic performance maintains what we’ve been seeing, which has been great. I think if anything, it may cause a delayed rollout on some of the international markets. But it’s too early to tell.

Alison Sider : And I also wanted to see if Delta has any view on some of the proposals that Congress is considering around simulator training counting towards pilot experience hours? Is that something you do favorably or if Delta would have any plans to offer a training program of its own if the Senate proposal goes through or how you’re thinking about that?

Peter Carter : Alison, it’s Peter. Delta has not weighed in on those particular proposals. We think the way pilots are trained is obviously incredibly effective, and it’s important to maintain those type of training requirements.

Operator: Your next question is coming from Leslie Josephs from CNBC.

Leslie Josephs: Also wondering if Delta has any view on raising the pilot age potentially to 67, if not beyond that, at some point? And then also with the affirmative action ruling from last month, is Delta reviewing or looking at its current DEI policies and you’re expecting any changes that has to make?

Ed Bastian : Leslie, I’ll take the first. No, we don’t have a point of view on that. I think that’s something that within the pilot community, there’s a lot of different opinions around. So we’ll stand by and observe and watch how that discussion unfolds. Peter will touch on the affirmative action.

Peter Carter : Yes. Hello, Leslie. I will tell you at Delta, we continue to be fully committed to our DE&I objectives. And also, we don’t have an affirmative action for it in Delta. We always hire the very best.

Operator: Your next question is coming from Mary Schlangenstein from Bloomberg News.