American Airlines January load factor falls as capacity grows while traffic declines

American Airlines Group Inc. reported Thursday that January travel demand declined slightly from a year ago despite an increase in seat supply. Traffic slipped 0.3% to 17.0 billion revenue passenger miles, while capacity increased 1.2% to 21.7 billion available seat miles. That pushed the load factor down to 78.6% from 79.7%. Domestically, traffic fell 1.7% to 9.66 billion RPMs, while capacity increased 0.8% to 12.04 billion ASMs, to knock load factor down to 80.2% from 82.3%. The air carrier affirmed its first-quarter outlook of total revenue per available seat mile (TRASM) growth of 2.5% to 4.5%. The stock, which was still inactive in premarket trade, has rallied 24% over the past 12 months, while the NYSE Arca Airline Index has soared 43% and the S&P 500 has climbed 24%.

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