
United Airlines stock losing $950M in value - anigbrowl
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/united-airlines-shares-tumbling-140648573.html
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danderino
I think this is a pointless figure for a number of reasons.

1\. Their stock is where it was last Friday.

2\. We don't know how much the stock dropping is due to the outrage or due to
whatever else. 1-3% fluctuations in stock, even intra-day are common. Delta
airlines today for example lost 2.2% whereas UAL lost 1%. And the whole market
has been down this week.

3\. When Amazon loses 1% of its stock, it loses 4 billion in "value".

4\. Loss in market cap is not loss in value to United. Its a loss to
shareholders collectively.

5\. The short term losses don't mean anything if it rebounds.

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guiambros
It's wishful thinking. People love to think they have more influence over the
destiny of corporations than they really do. And, of course, the media loves
to pile on.

Sure, voting with your wallet, when done _en masse_ and over a _long_ period
of time, can have a significant impact. But this takes much more than a few
days.

What UAL did in this case was horrendous, but trying to associate it with loss
of market cap is disingenuous. The market always corrects itself after the
initial fluctuations. It will depend primarily on their earnings on Monday
[1].

[1] [http://finance.yahoo.com/news/united-continental-
ual-q1-earn...](http://finance.yahoo.com/news/united-continental-
ual-q1-earnings-145702240.html)

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danderino
>What UAL did in this case was horrendous,

Was it?

All I see is that a passenger was asked to leave by an officer. He refused and
was forcibly removed.

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metaphorm
creeping authoritarianism, more and more of it every day, and you just take it
like ok, like it's a good thing. what ever happened to freedom and liberty?
what ever happened to dignity and respect?

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trendia
I am no expert on the economics of airlines, but my gut tells me that it would
have been cheaper for the 4 United workers to miss their next shifts (and pay
overtime to 4 other workers) than to rip a doctor out of his seat against his
will and suffer the wrath of the consumer.

~~~
ams6110
Pilots and (I think) cabin crew have work hour limits by law. You can't just
pay them overtime to work more hours. If you don't have under-limit crew in
place, you have to start canceling flights.

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ziszis
And then UAL gained back almost the full value by Wednesday morning and has
performed similar to Delta and other airlines. Like most PR disasters unless
you keep digging when you are in a hole, the long-term impact is small and
consumers forget.

Uber is in the hole right now and digging. Microsoft used to be. Amazon used
to be.

[https://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3AUAL](https://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3AUAL)

