Great. So, let's keep the content going in the Travel and Leisure Conference. Welcome, everyone. Thanks for coming. For those who don't know me, I'm Ravi Shanker. I cover freight, transportation, and airlines here at Morgan Stanley. And very happy to kick off the airlines content here with JetBlue, and happy to have with us CFO Ursula Hurley and President Marty St. George. Thanks so much for being here. Good morning. Good morning. Glad to be here. Good to see everyone. Yep. So, Ursula, maybe you want to just kick off by walking us through the 8-K that you guys put out this morning. A little bit of a guidance numbers update seemed pretty good overall. Sure, yeah. So we did issue the 8-K, and we actually are seeing really strong operational performance. So we're actually running a completion factor upwards of 99% for the first two months of the quarter. And that has resulted in us improving our revenue guidance by 0.5 point. And then we also improved our controllable cost guide by 0.5 point as well. So naturally, when you're running a better operation, you know, we expected to see improvement in revenue as well as the controllable cost side. Fuel continues to be exceptionally volatile. We did decrease our fuel guide to the tune of about $0.15. I think we're pleased with what we're seeing in terms of the demand environment. Everything is in line with what we expected. Like I said, running a healthy operation, you know, the cost side of the business has performed really well. Great. So I do have a bunch of questions on the cycle and what you're seeing out there. But maybe before that, just to set the table here, JetBlue obviously has been through a lot in the last kind of 24 months. So maybe for those unfamiliar with the story here in the room, maybe kind of reset the table here. Kind of give us a little bit of a summary of, you know, where you are right now, kind of what's on the table, what's off the table, kind of what the focus areas are, and kind of what we can look forward to over the next 12 months. Yeah. So thanks for the question. So, in light of the Spirit transaction falling to the wayside back in January, we have pivoted and we're actioning very quickly. Our number one priority is getting this business back to sustained profitability. And so you've seen us do a couple things thus far. Number one, we executed an aircraft deferral back in January to streamline the order book, and help better set us up in terms of the growth profile, to deliver consistent profitability. We also have been actioning on the network side, so we're evolving the network. We have a very high tolerance for and threshold for routes that are underperforming. So we've closed or will have closed 8 cities. We're expanding in different markets, we're focused on the leisure customer. We've also announced $300 million in revenue initiatives. About two-thirds of the $300 million is strictly ancillary revenue. And that's progressing well, and we're actioning very well. We're pleased with the progress that we're seeing on those initiatives. And then, you know, controllable costs. This is in our DNA. It continues to be a laser focus, especially in light of us not growing. We've been focused on ripping and taking out fixed costs out of the business. So we're actioning. There's gonna continue to be more action to help drive this business to sustain profitability. And so that's what we've been focused on. Got it. I'm gonna come back to some of those idiosyncratic factors a little bit later on. But maybe, to kick off, kind of you said earlier in your opening comments that demand looks pretty robust. Can you elaborate on that a little bit more? Obviously, you should have a pretty good idea into what early summer looks like at this point. Very difficult comps, because last year was great for the industry. So kind of what are you seeing out there in terms of the funnel and kind of early bookings and maybe some of the seasonality as well? Well, I'll start by saying, you know, we did just do a guide with in effect, improved revenue performance for the quarter. In general, things are at or a little bit above our expectations. I think I'd take in a couple of pieces. I think, first of all, we are seeing strength really pretty much across the network that is reflected in the 8-K this morning. Probably a little bit biased towards Florida, which is, you know, about a third of our ASM. Mm-hmm. So, that's been helpful for us, number one. Number two, we are starting to see competitive capacity pressure go down a little bit, and, in fact, I think a couple of airlines have made comments about reductions in some of our key markets last week, so that is actually coming true. And I can't stress enough the benefit of, you know, the, you know, relatively good weather environment, air traffic control. We're running a good operation. It's helping us keep costs down. So overall, you know, we're very happy with the guide that we gave today. Obviously, we have a long way to go- Mm-hmm. And through a lot of the initiatives that we've talked about, I think that's clear, but you know, first steps are we're happy. Nice. When do you start to get the first glimpses into a post-summer, kind of fall-type travel period? Kind of the last few years, that's usually been the little bit of the stumble the industry had, kind of, in going from summer to the fall. When do you get a sense of what that looks like? We're probably a month or two away before we have a good vision on that. I think the two things I'd mention about that part of the year is, I think it's worth noting, you know, we have gone through, I would call it two and a half rounds of route changes and aircraft redeployment. Mm-hmm. There will be at least one more round after this. They're very much based on seasonality. Yep. So, as we leave the peak summer, we'll have some of the stuff that's very good in the summer that will go away and then redeploy it to winter destinations. It'll be closing, you know, there will be other markets that will be closed. So we are exercising a lot of self-help in the at the end of the year. As far as the industry goes, so far, knock on wood, what we're seeing in competitive capacity is trending the way we'd like it to. Yep. So overall, we have no reason to be pessimistic about the second half of the year. I think we're very happy with what we're seeing going forward. Got it. So two follow-ups on that. One is on seasonality. Do you know what normal is? I mean, we've had, like, coming out of the pandemic, like, we've had such major fluctuations in trends that we had pre-pandemic, right? We had, like, corporate kind of not really come back. You had massive peaks and troughs, and then you had the peaks come down, but the troughs also go up, and then closing bookings were super strong, and then closing bookings fell away. Do you know what normal seasonality is anymore? Well, I think normal is being refined every quarter. Yep. You know, I think if you look at, very clear, the first half of 2023 was not normal. And then we reverted a little bit to the mean, second half of 2023. You know, I will, I believe it's possible that we're coming into normalcy in 2024. Mm-hmm. But frankly, we've seen so much fluctuation in the last 3, 4 years. I would not pretend to say this is normal. Our job is to, you know, play the hand that dealt us with demand- Yep. Try to optimize use of the assets as best possible. Got it. And the second follow-up I had on this, Marty, were, on the competitive capacity. A, how much of that—I mean, obviously, there's been a lot of focus on competitive capacity in the big domestic winning destinations and your international post-pandemic, right? There was too much capacity put in, and it wasn't enough taken out as people started to go to other places. A, how much of that do you think was a function of this evolving seasonality, where people didn't quite—like, you guys didn't quite know what the right number of, for capacity was? B, how much of that was kind of industry bad behavior that's now getting pulled back? Kind of, what's the outlook there for normalizing demand versus supply in those markets? I would not pretend to explain what my competitors do from month- to- month. Yeah. That one, you have to ask them that question. What I would say is, at the end of the day, we're all in the same boat. We all have assets, we all need to create returns. Yep. You know, we were looking at our performance in this region, and, you know, again, Latin America, which I think is the best example of this recently, historically, was very profitable for us. It's still profitable, but obviously, it's down from what we had expected it to be. Yep. And I think, you know, my worst nightmare would be to see my competitors saying, "This is great. We've never done any better." That's not what happened. They came out and said, "We're really being stressed." And they, in fact, gave RASM guidance that, you know, we looked at and said, "Hmm, okay, that sounds very familiar." And at the end of the day, we all have assets. We've all had investments from our investors that are, you know, they're giving us the money, trusting us to make the most money with it. Right. My view of the world is, you will, I hate to use the phrase, revert to the mean, because it's not really reverting to the mean per se. Sure. You will revert to the best and highest unencumbered asset. You know, we're doing it, and I think we're seeing our competitors do it as well. Yeah, I think the key difference, and this may be me as a sales analyst speaking, but, I think in the past, the industry would have said, "Hey, we have too much capacity in these areas, and I'll pay. That sucks in the near term, but we'll grow in it over time." But now the industry is saying: We're actually going to pull back and take that capacity out and actually acting on it. Kind of, do you think it is going to lead to better behavior? Kind of, is this discipline structural? Kind of, what... How do you see that kind of playing out in the coming years? Okay, the only behavior I control is my own. So from that perspective, I do not want to speculate about what my competitors' outlooks in the world are going to be and stuff like that. But I do... You know, I fundamentally believe Adam Smith is a very smart guy. You know, when a lot of capacity went in, we saw price come down, we saw margin go down, and that ultimately is not a long-term equilibrium. Right. And I expect that as an industry, you know, we have the luxury, unlike our friends in the hotel world, who you're going to see later today, we have the luxury of being able to move our hotels- Yep. So to speak. So, you know, we're going to exercise that. But, but- And frankly, we were, we were very much, and this was before my time, so I can—I'm reporting this. You know, we were very much frozen in place during the regulatory process for the Spirit merger. So I think what people don't fully understand, you know, when you get questions like: What took you so long? It's like, "Oh, no, we, we knew what we wanted to do. We just needed that deal to resolve itself one way or the other. Right. Then once it's resolved, like, right into it. Yeah. But, also follow on something you said about, about LatAm, because that appears to be probably the softest area or maybe the most, imbalanced area in the world right now, probably. How did it get to that point? How does that resolve itself? Kind of, does capacity need to come out? Do you expect a leg up in growth to fit into that capacity? Kind of, how do you see LatAm in, in the coming months? Well, I think first and foremost, I think it's worth saying that we don't see it as one region. Sure. Because we have two dramatically different market presences there and performance there. And I would split it between the visiting friends and relatives market and then the beach leisure market. Yep. The visiting friends and relatives market has been a very strong franchise of ours for 20 years and continues to be a strong franchise. These are the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Haiti, when Haiti opens up again, which should be today, I think. You know, some of these markets, Jamaica, some of these markets that have been profitable for us, and we've got a very strong customer base that's very much accustomed to flying us back and forth. Also extremely lucky that we have a big presence in New York, South Florida, Boston, which are the big origin markets for those. So that is actually a very reliable franchise for us. The beach markets, I think, is where we had seen a much more of a whipsawing effect. And I think frankly, it's partially a reaction to this change in the business leisure mix- Mm-hmm. Where we are seeing more leisure, you know, more leisure travel than some of the total. You know, Ursula mentioned earlier, we had, I think from 2019 to now, 60% increase in Latin overall- Mm-hmm. Capacity, and that's even higher in the beach markets. Ultimately, there are not enough hotels to actually accommodate all that demand. So, you know, you can't bang your head against the wall for too long before you actually have to react to it. I believe, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, Urs, I believe we're actually down in those markets for, like, 1% or 2% the first half of the year, right? Right. We looked at that and said, "No more growth. We have other places to grow." That was not the case with our competitors- Mm-hmm. But we had a negative impact-... the overall solution of the market. But again, I'm going with emphasis on that. Ultimately, this is going to resolve itself. Yeah. Hopefully, we'll see some of that good behavior kind of similar into that end as well. Personally, you said earlier, you're focusing on the leisure markets, but obviously, you're also because of your Northeast exposure, kind of default into somewhat of a corporate airline as well. Remind us again, what is your corporate mix today? What are you seeing in terms of normalization of corporate, especially in the East Coast, kind of with banking and other sectors? Kind of where do you see that going in the future? Yeah, I mean, historically, we've been about 80% leisure, 20% business. I mean, we've been pleased with what we're seeing in terms of the business travel improvement. It, it's just a much smaller portion of our overarching network. So, while we continue to see the trends that some of the others are seeing, we just don't have as much exposure there. Sure. Got it. And the other big trend in the industry is the premiumization of the entire industry. This is not just international and corporate, it's domestic, leisure, VFR as well. Obviously, you are a bit of a rare commodity in that you're a effectively a domestic airline, kind of, with a premium product, kind of. And Mint is a very, very well-reviewed, kind of, a much-loved product out there. What's the, A, kind of, do you think this premiumization is real and structural? B, kind of, what can you do to expand the Mint offering across the airline? Yeah. So I'd say a couple of things. First of all, we do think this is real. And it's funny because when we first launched Mint 10 years ago, we said it was going to be 13 airplanes, and we promised the board it would only be 13 airplanes. Now it's 52 or 53, something like that. And I'm very happy as we've come out of COVID, that that product was there because it's been a shining star for us. Yep. As far as our performance. It's also one of the things that's driven a lot of the network changes that we announced in the last few months, because there's a high opportunity cost to Mint airplanes. Yep. The hurdle is, you know, the hurdle is impressive as far as where the planes need to go. Obviously, we, you know, we're a couple of years into our growth in Europe. That's sort of revenue-wise, trending as far as where we'd expected to trend. But at the same time, we have other places that are better uses for the airplane. Mm-hmm. And especially with the structure of the order book that we're seeing in the next few years, it's going to put that much more pressure on making sure that the Mint airplanes go in the sort of best and highest use. So, you know, for example, we take 2 planes out of Gatwick, they go into Phoenix in the winter. So on a very simple level, we have opportunities where we're very optimistic about the benefits for Mint. We're actually doing... You know, what's nice about it is we have, you know, we had tried Phoenix last year, was extremely successful. Was like, okay, now that's working, we can do more of it. This year, the sort of development market, we're looking at is San Juan. Mm-hmm. You know, New York, San Juan. If you look at sort of the prime flight, which is, you know, the 9 A.M. out of New York and midday back, that is the best flight as far as yields that we have. So, you know, we'll see how Mint does on that. I'm very comfortable making experiments like that. Sure. I think if I look at what we saw for results last year with the where we put the planes to the West, it proved that, you know, seasonal changes like that have relatively quick ramps up because the product is so good- Mm-hmm. In my opinion. And B, that, you know, we should— You know, we, we've said to the team, you know, if you only fail one time out of 10, you're not pushing hard enough as far as taking risks, as far as where we want to fly. There is, you know, I'd say 75% science and 25% art, as far as where to deploy airplanes. And if you looked at the published data about Fort Lauderdale, Phoenix- Mm-hmm. It would not have said that would be a good market. It actually, we're seeing results that we're like, "Yes, that's a good market." So, you know, the beauty of the product is it is a drawer in itself, and I think that's it's generating demand. Number two, I don't want to forget the fact that we've got, you know, a very robust premium legroom product across the entire fleet- Right Which also is growing significantly higher. The RASM of that fleet, of that cabin is growing significantly higher than the rest of the airline. Right. It has definitely been a premium-led recovery for us. If you look at some of the revenue initiatives that we laid out, they're actually very much tied towards monetizing that premium presence right now. Got it. That's, that's great to hear. Just very quickly on international, kind of how's that growth coming along? You're flying to Paris now, so kind of, any, any color on Olympics, demand, travel, kind of, that you can share with us? What I would say about Europe is it's, you know, it's trending right where we expected it to trend on revenue. I'd say it's trending worse on costs, and, you know, we're pretty candid about things like that. Sure. So we still have improvement. But again, the Mint airplane is very valuable. You know, I'm actually very happy with the experiments we did this summer with Edinburgh and Dublin. Yep. Which are really strong peak, strong pre-peak summer markets. And then we know we have peak winter markets, where we can move the airplanes back and forth. So I think you'll continue to see us a little more agile about that going forward. Yeah, the beauty of doing Europe with a narrow body is it's much easier to redeploy- Right. in the domestic. Right. Got it. So maybe kind of switching gears away from the top line. So you mentioned earlier about, you know, you have given up some routes, kind of maybe some more routes to give up, which is not something you see from airlines often. Again, shows that, you know, this is an industry that is focused very much on returns and margin, and not just like a big land grab across space. Can you just talk a little more through that decision? Kind of where's the threshold? Kind of what are you looking at before you decide that, and kind of how much more room is there for rationalizing network here? Yeah, so Marty mentioned it earlier. I mean, we've gone through a couple rounds of network changes, and there's probably some more to come. I think as he also referenced, we had been in a holding pattern given the Spirit transaction. So we didn't make material network moves over the last two years, quite frankly, because we didn't know if we were gonna be a combined entity or a separate entity. And so now we're working through that. And, you know, we've found ourselves in a position where just not enough of the network is contributing from a profitability perspective, and so we have no choice but to action and put these aircraft in places that we think are gonna drive better profitability. Yep. So more to come. I think you're gonna continue to see us, as Marty pointed out, like, try new things, right? Like, I think we're more open to seasonal service. We're obviously honing in on the leisure customer type, and we're leveraging, you know, the premium-type seats that we have. You know, about 26% of the seats on our airplanes are considered, quote, unquote, "like premium" between Mint and Even More Space. And there's probably Even More opportunity there- Right To more optimize how we're merchandising to customers. So our hurdle rates have definitely increased. We have a lower, you know, threshold for sitting things out. We've got to get the business back to making money consistently, and a big part of that is the network and the schedule and how we continue to optimize that. So more to come. Got it. And speaking of the constraints or external constraints on capacity growth, ATC capacity and GTF issues, can you address both of them? I mean, last year you saw, I know, ATC kind of force airlines to draw down their summer schedules. Do you think we'll be in that same situation this time, or do you think you're better staffed? And B, obviously, GTF is a very difficult situation for you and a couple of your peers. How do you see that kind of play out, and what color do you have in terms of the timeline for that? Yeah. ATC was a very material challenge for us last summer, just given the amount of exposure we have in the Northeast. We're very pleased that the slot waiver continues to be in place. Yep Through the fall timeframe. We're going to be a proponent to keep that slot waiver in place, even yeah, beyond the fall timeframe. You know, I'll be honest, in our-- I mentioned that we had a 99% completion factor for the first two months of the quarter. We're not expecting June to perform as well. We do have a level of conservatism, given last June was exceptionally challenging, the last two weeks of June in 2023. So, you know, ATC has not materially changed staffing levels yet. We believe that this is gonna be a multiyear, Yep Challenge. So we have planned as best as we can. We're investing in reliability in general. And like I said, we've started to see some of that pay off, and we're gonna watch the summer very closely. In terms of the GTF engine, we continue to experience that headwind. We'll have on average 11 aircraft out of service this year due to GTF. I do expect that to increase in 2025, the number of aircraft that we will have on the ground. So we are in a challenging place in terms of the lack of growth. And that's very unique for us, coming out of COVID. One thing we are doing is we're investing and keeping our A320 aircraft in the fleet longer. We have over 30 that we are investing in terms of maintenance overhauls to continue to keep those flying, to backfill at least a portion of the capacity loss that we're seeing due to GTF. Got it. I'll open it up to see if any questions from the audience. Connor? Hi, guys. Connor Dwyer here from actually European Airlines, Morgan Stanley. You mentioned for Europe that the revenue development has been roughly as you'd expect, but perhaps the cost a little bit worse. I'm just wondering if you could give a bit more color on that in terms of what exactly is driving that. And actually, just as a second question, just on the GTF, obviously, it's not helpful in terms of the level of growth. Just wondering, do you have a deal with Pratt & Whitney in terms of compensation for that? Does that help substantially, or is it still kind of a pretty sizable net negative? Thanks very much. Sure. So I'll start with the second question first, the GTF. So we settled with Pratt & Whitney on compensation for 2023, so that was baked into our 2023 results. We are still working with Pratt & Whitney on 2024 compensation. The challenge is the accounting treatment for that is going to prevent us from taking the full benefit in the P&L, which we originally had anticipated. So, we assumed that all compensation from Pratt could reduce our operating expense this year, so that was baked into our full-year controllable cost guide. That since has reversed. However, we're gonna try to offset at least a significant portion of that. So more to come as we continue to work with Pratt on 2024 compensation. In regards to the costs on the transatlantic flying, we did the transatlantic business case prior to COVID. And what has happened since COVID is, we all know our pilot pay rates have significantly increased. And quite frankly, just the overarching cost to operate and serve each customer, i.e., food and beverage, those costs have gone up as well. So we're trying to make, you know, decisions on how do we overcome some of those costs? How do we do it in a thoughtful way, and that won't significantly detriment the customer experience? Are you seeing customer elasticity on pricing at all? You know, obviously, the customer is also used to inflation being in the headlines, right? So, can you push on RASM, kind of, even though this is a competitive environment? Certainly, Amit, we're seeing, I think, I think the challenge in the industry is that there's, if you're sitting in a premium cabin on any of the full-service airlines, you've got the mix of the people. Let's talk Atlantic first and foremost. You've got a mix of people paying $4,000, and you've got other people who paid $800 and upgraded. Sure. Our strategy from the beginning has been much more, you know, very, very limited upgrades. It's only from Mosaic 3 and 4s, so the highest level of Mosaic has the ability to upgrade with a limited number. And our goal is to actually price it and monetize the cabins with, with price. And I think when you look at the upside we've seen in premium leisure, that's been a very much a big chunk of it. So if it's, you know, Saturday night to Europe, which tends to be not a great time to do it, to get business travel, you know, we can definitely take premium leisure on those flights and do very well, and we can do that through price. Second thing is, and I'll say the other side of elasticity, which is, we did go and add in a premium seat fee, which most of our competitors have done. So it's for the seats that are not Even More on the domestic fleet, but sort of out of the windows in the front of the airplane. You know, that and Ursula said that that was a big chunk of the $300 million revenue initiative. That's actually tracking ahead of where we'd expected. Yeah. Customers are definitely willing to pay for that experience. You know, I think this is our job, which is try to find the opportunities where there is value that we can give the customers that they're willing to pay for. That will hopefully be accretive for us. You know, the $300 million initiative this year is the first step. I think that's gonna be a continuous process. Any more questions from the audience? Yeah, one in the back. How's it going? Thanks. It's obviously been a tough stretch for JetBlue, for everyone involved, customers, your employees, your stock. Just remind us where you and the board have kind of laid out the path forward in terms of, like, adapting to different priorities and, you know, getting through the SAVE mess, and now you're on a different path. You got a relatively good network. Like you said, you're big in Florida. Just remind us on sort of the big lessons learned and how you're pivoting the path forward to, you know, emulate others that are obviously doing much better in the industry. Thanks. Yeah. So listen, we tried to place a couple of really big bets that didn't go in our favor. And I think we've shown since January that we are pivoting very quickly to action change so that we can drive profitability and more effectively compete against the peer set. I think that what's unique about JetBlue is we've got the brand, we've got really attractive real estate, and we need to capitalize on that. And, we're actioning across the network. The revenue initiatives, as I mentioned earlier, are kind of phase number one. I think there's opportunities to better merchandise to our customer base. And then given in light of the headwinds whereby which we're not growing, we've got to continue to attack the fixed cost base. So I do believe that, you know, the business model of serving the underserved customer that doesn't get treated exceptionally well by the legacy carriers, is our niche. And we can leverage that given our real estate and our brand, and we got to do that in a reliable manner. And so I hope that you've seen that since January, you know, nothing is going untouched and everything is on the table right now. We've got to get the business back to consistent profitability, but I think, you know, our benefits and what we can offer stand out and we got to better leverage that. Any more questions? So maybe close out with some thoughts on the balance sheet and kind of what's the right level of leverage. Obviously, still a lot more work to chop for you, and therein lies the opportunity. But kind of, what do you think are like cash is priority at the time? Yeah, listen, the balance sheet has always been a top priority of JetBlue. We came into the pandemic with the second-best balance sheet in the sector. Clearly, we've been going through a challenging time, and so the priority of getting the business up to profitability and consistent profitability is priority number one. We've got to get to a place where we see a path to deliver free cash flows so that we can then turn around and start delevering. So in the meantime, we've got to finance the business in the most effective manner that we can. So, we've got a very healthy unencumbered asset base, which I think is a little different from some of our peers in the sector. We still have our loyalty program that's unencumbered. We've got slots, gates, and routes, brand, aircraft, engines, and so that allows us flexibility to assess all markets and tap those markets in a cost-effective manner, but also build in flexibility in terms of prepayments, so that when we do get to free cash flow, we can start to delever. So balance sheet continues to be a very, very high, high priority. Got it. And just gonna... We have a few seconds left, so I'll just squeeze one more in. Just kind of on, on the cost, you, you mentioned $300 million in incremental revenue opportunities. Feels like you guys are taking a fresh, clean sheet look at the cost structure post all the distractions going away. Do you have a sense of what - how big that bucket is? Kind of how much low-hanging fruit, kind of what, what's the opportunity size? Yeah, it's a good question. I mean, we communicated earlier, like, there's about 0.5 point of controllable costs that we've taken out of the business, just driven by fixed costs. Yep. We did a voluntary opt-out program. We're revisiting our real estate footprint in places like LaGuardia and LAX, given the network evolution. But this is an endless journey. Like, there's still a lot more. We have committed to have an Investor Day later- Sure. This year, and so we hope to lay out a multi-year plan with targets, and obviously, controllable costs are gonna continue to be ever more important. We've got to maintain the benefit that we have against the legacy carriers, so that we can get the business back to consistent profitability. Got it. Exciting times at JetBlue. I think the Investor Day is gonna be a pretty key catalyst for the stock. Ursula, Marty, thanks so much for joining us. Thank you very much. Thank you for having us, Ravi.