Hii ni pesa kidogo

20x & 20% is a huge difference...!

I keep wondering, where these new planes will fly to? Most of the routes in Africa are covered and in any case they need to cull some of the African routes and replace them with a few new good ones

It can't be rise in price of fuel that is making KQ make losses. Some of the extra fuel bill is as a result of expensive hedges taken haphazardly, as well as more miles flown from extra capacity. KQ added an old fuel guzzling 747-400 freighter and 3 embraers in 2012. Furthermore we all get hit with the fuel surcharge once in a while when fuel prices run out of hand.


Airline business is too volatile, competitive and margins are always under pressure. The 200B debt will most likely disorganize the airline. If KQ was run efficiently like a business with lofty ambitions and willing to back it's mouth with solid cash it should by now have accumulated 100B in equity reserves and come for some equity by way of rights before proceeding to borrow the 200B.

However this is not the case and the business has been poorly run since 2007. It hasn't generated a competitive return to give investors a sense of comfort that it can take debt to fund an ambitious expansion. Since 2007 it's reserves have remained in the lower 20B levels. Management is doing too much dreaming without necessarily backing the dreams with rigorous thought process. For me a debt of 200B for KQ to fund expansion with current management is suicidal. This will only lead to a bail out by government in the long run - (Future finance minister please create a contingency for this).

20%, and lets move on to substantive discussion.

Ex-div and KQ has seen a balance of buys and sales by foreigners at 8.9M with a volume of more than 1M shares. Is it basing out, we will know in a few weeks time.