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http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/13/business/13delta.html
August 13, 2005
Delta Said to Explore Bankruptcy Financing
By MICHELINE MAYNARD
Delta Air Lines has begun arranging the financing it will need if it seeks bankruptcy protection, something Wall Street analysts, industry executives and finance experts say could happen within weeks, people with direct knowledge of Delta's actions said yesterday.
Delta, which is based in Atlanta, is holding discussions with lenders like GE Commercial Finance, which provided it restructuring money last year and could do so again, in or out of bankruptcy, these people and others in the financial community said. A spokesman for GE Commercial declined to comment.
The airline is also exploring the sale or refinancing of its two commuter lines, Comair and Atlantic Southeast Airlines. And it is looking for more savings from employees, who have already taken $1.4 billion a year in wage and benefit cuts, although it does not plan to reduce wages.
Delta has lost nearly $10 billion since 2001, with its losses accelerating over the last year. Its chief executive, Gerald Grinstein, had emphasized a desire to avoid Chapter 11 bankruptcy, which it barely averted last October by obtaining $1 billion in cuts from its pilots. But last month, Mr. Grinstein said that circumstances beyond Delta's control, namely higher oil prices and industry competition, could force its hand.
And with the airline's obligations mounting, officials acknowledged yesterday that it needed to be financially prepared for a filing, which legal experts say it would probably do in New York. They said a final decision was not imminent, however.
The federal bankruptcy code will undergo significant changes on Oct. 17, limiting the amount of time companies can take to draft restructuring plans. Mr. Grinstein said last month that the date did not factor into Delta's thinking, however.
It is not clear how much financing Delta would need to enter bankruptcy. United Airlines, which has been in bankruptcy protection since 2002, originally arranged $1.5 billion in so-called debtor-in-possession financing from five lenders, and has since obtained more.
Delta, the third-largest domestic airline behind American and United, is in the midst of a revamping aimed at cutting $5 billion from its costs through 2006. But the rising cost of jet fuel has already made its assumptions obsolete.
Each 1-cent increase in the price of jet fuel costs the company an additional $25 million. Fuel has climbed 35 cents a gallon since January, according to the Energy Department, meaning that Delta needs to cut another $875 million to cover the difference in fuel price, according to the airline's calculations.
That is aside from hundreds of millions of dollars more that the airline must find to comply with various financial obligations over the next few months.
Delta's first deadline comes on Aug. 29, when its existing credit card processing agreement expires. Without a new processor to handle MasterCard and Visa transactions, Delta could not sell tickets to customers using those credit cards. It has to have a credit card processor going into bankruptcy, when many passengers pay by credit cards so that they will be protected.
This week, Delta sought a five-day extension in a required regulatory filing involving its second-quarter results, saying that it was in talks with the processor, which it did not identify.
Yesterday, it said that it planned to file its results by Monday, when the extension runs out. But it does not expect to have the credit card agreement in place before then.
In disclosing the discussions, Delta said that it was being asked to put a significant amount of money in reserve to complete the deal. People close to the talks say Delta is being asked to set aside $300 million to $800 million. The airline did not comment on those figures.
Delta ended the second quarter with just under $1.8 billion in cash. Its agreements with GE Commercial Finance and American Express, which it renegotiated in May, require it to keep $1 billion in cash on hand through 2007.
Some analysts have suggested that Delta might seek bankruptcy protection if its cash falls below $1.4 billion. But Delta executives have said that there is no "magic number" and that they would feel comfortable operating with less cash, given that the company has cut expenses.
So Delta conceivably would be able to provide the reserve sought by the credit card processor. But people close to its discussions say it is exploring ways to avoid that. One way would be to persuade another lender to underwrite the amount, basically providing a guarantee that Delta would honor its obligation, but allowing Delta to use its cash to run its operations and meet its other obligations.
Along with the credit card agreement, Delta must make the remaining $135 million that it owes in pension contributions for 2005. It also faces $100 million in debt payments this quarter, and another $335 million in the fourth quarter, including a corporate bond payment due in December.
David Strine, an airline industry analyst at Bear Stearns, said he doubted that Delta could cover the obligations and withstand higher fuel prices. Mr. Strine predicted Delta would be forced to seek bankruptcy protection by the end of September, if not sooner.
"There are still things that they can do but as time goes by, with oil going up every day, the options become fewer and fewer," he said yesterday.
Selling or refinancing its commuter airlines would be one immediate way to raise money, either to avoid bankruptcy or operate under Chapter 11 protection.
Delta also has the option of going back to its employees. This week, Jamie Baker, a J. P. Morgan analyst, predicted Delta would seek $400 million in further cuts, including $275 million from pilots and $125 million from other workers.
Both Delta and the pilots' union denied that any request for cuts had been made. And, Mr. Grinstein has ruled out more pay cuts several times.
Instead, the airline could focus instead on productivity improvements, which it says could yield as much or even more in savings than simply cutting wages. That could save face for both Delta and its workers, said Gary N. Chaison, professor of industrial relations at Clark University in Worcester, Mass.
"It opens up a door for concessions, but on a friendlier basis," Professor Chaison said. "They could say it is joint problem solving."
Company officials and finance experts agree, however, that the savings could not come quickly enough for Delta to meet the payments it owes now. Likewise, its problems are too big to be solved by a single move, Mr. Strine said.
"There are a lot of pieces of the puzzle that have to fit together, and if any one piece of it doesn't come about, it could all unravel," he said.
While Delta has pointed to significantly lower costs from its cuts thus far, its crisis proves its approach was faulty, said Kevin Healy, vice president for planning at AirTran Airways, a low-fare airline that has challenged Delta at its Atlanta hub.
"They've really not done anything to improve the company or fundamentally restructure themselves," Mr. Healy said. "And if they keep doing what they're doing, it won't be the solution."
Don't count on it..Since the TSA has become the "Professional" airport security unit in the this Country, a change like that will take a year of Congressional hearings.
Post the Pics! 
