American Airlines Group Inc (AAL)

[dgras0007]

Anyone talking about balance sheets, debt, assets etc as a sole basis to determine American Airlines future is flawed at base. Quantitative factors are important, no denying in that but and here comes the crucial but: the biggest asset of AA are not their planes, cashflow or any of those. It's their brand. American Airlines is the strongest brand out there in terms of carriers thus giving the company a tremendous value in terms of negotiating or leveraging a merger. Companies at this level can not be compared to other companies or whatever outlook/fate those companies might have had. They are on their own league so all bets, comparisons, associations etc are off. WAMU might have gone BK but Citi would never have. Why: GLOBAL BRAND RECOGNITION.