Singapore Airlines on Thursday reported a 27% fall in Q3 net profit but beat expectations as revenue growth helped offset higher fuel costs. The airline is in the second year of a three-year transformation plan designed to cut costs and boost revenue to better compete against Chinese, Middle Eastern and low-cost rivals. It said forward bookings were tracking in line with its capacity growth but warned uncertainties surrounding US-China trade tariffs and Brexit were clouding the overall demand outlook for passengers and cargo. SIA made S$284m ($209m) in the three months ended Dec. 31, down from S$389 million a year-earlier, which was restated to reflect accounting changes. That beat the S$240.2m expected by three analysts in estimates obtained by Reuters and Refinitiv. Group revenues rose 7% to S$4.34b in Q3, despite flat average ticket prices as the airline filled a higher percentage of seats and increased capacity by 5%. During the quarter, the airline began a significant expansion of capacity to the US, resuming non-stop flights to New York and Los Angeles after a five-year hiatus. Jet fuel prices fell sharply during the December quarter but the airline said it paid 22.2% more on average than a year earlier. The carrier has hedged 80% of its fuel for Q4 at an average price of $74 a barrel.<br/>
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United will add service to Greenville-Spartanburg, Portland (Maine) and Syracuse from Denver this June, further building on its expansion at the Colorado airport. The carrier will offer daily service on all three routes, with Greenville and Syracuse operated with 76-seat Embraer 175s and Portland with 150-seat Airbus A320, it said Thursday. The Denver-Portland route will operate seasonally during the summer. The new routes come as United buoys its schedule in Denver today. The airline is rescheduling its flight banks – periods with a high number of departures and arrivals designed to facilitate connections – in a move that will see its average daily departures jump by 44 flights to 420 compared to February 2018, FlightGlobal schedules data shows. "As we build on the strengths of our mid-continent hubs, United’s optimised schedule along with the growth in destinations offered and frequency of flights allows us to deliver on what’s best for our customers – more flights and greater access to more of the places they want to go," said Ankit Gupta, VP of domestic network planning at United.<br/>