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Delta said Thursday that it lost $408m in the final three months of last year, as the Omicron variant of the coronavirus, which emerged late in that period, interfered with holiday operations and pushed back the airline’s recovery. About 8,000 Delta employees — more than one in 10 — had called out sick in recent weeks, Delta’s chief executive, Ed Bastian, said on CNBC on Thursday. That, combined with bad storms, forced the airline and its peers to cancel tens of thousands of flights over the busy holiday travel period, with carriers only just beginning to recover in recent days. “While the rapidly spreading Omicron variant has significantly impacted staffing levels and disrupted travel across the industry, Delta’s operation has stabilized over the last week and returned to preholiday performance,” Bastian said. “We are confident in a strong spring and summer travel season with significant pent-up demand for consumer and business travel.” The Omicron variant has delayed the airline recovery by about 60 days, Mr. Bastian said. Delta alone scrubbed more than 2,000 flights over the two weeks starting on Christmas Day, the fourth-most flight cancellations among US airlines. Despite the airline’s difficult year, Delta said it would spend about $100m to distribute bonuses of $1,250 to each of its 75,000 employees. “It’s going to be our recognition and our gesture of thanks to you for the hard work and the sacrifice and the service you’ve made on behalf of our company and on behalf of our customers,” Mr. Bastian said in a video message to employees announcing the bonuses, which will be distributed on Feb 14.<br/>

Delta Thursday reported higher quarterly earnings on the back of strong holiday travel demand and predicted a swift recovery from turbulence caused by the Omicron coronavirus variant, driving its shares higher. The company said surging COVID-19 cases will likely result in losses in January and February, resulting in a loss for the quarter through March. But it expects the recovery in travel demand to resume around late February, putting the carrier in a position to generate profit in the June, September and December quarters. Overall, it expects a "meaningful" profit in 2022 and backed its target to exceed the company's pre-pandemic financial performance by 2024. "If we could pick a period of time for an Omicron variant to surge, we would probably pick this time of year," Delta's President Glen Hauenstein told investors on a call. Air travel demand tends to be the weakest in the first quarter. The company said bookings for international travel were down, but Delta believes the transatlantic market will have a strong spring and summer once Omicron-driven border restrictions are lifted.<br/>

Delta CEO Ed Bastian said about 8,000 of its 75,000 employees tested positive for Covid-19 over the last four weeks, absences that marred the company’s financial results during a busy holiday travel season. Delta reported a loss for the quarter and forecast another for the first three months of the year because of the fast-spreading omicron variant, but predicted travel would begin to rebound again in late February. A series of winter storms and airline crews sidelined by omicron infections contributed to more than 20,000 U.S. flight cancellations industrywide between Christmas Eve and the first week of January. Flight cancellations have eased significantly in the past few days. Delta said that its operation has since stabilized and that 1% of its flights were canceled over the past week because of omicron.<br/>

Delta said Wednesday it will extend through 2023 the window for customers to rebook credits earned when they purchased but then canceled flights during the pandemic. Before the announcement, Delta flight credits were set to expire at the end of 2022. The new date will also apply to all tickets bought in 2022. Customers will be able to use the credits throughout 2024 if the trip is booked by Dec. 31, 2023, the airline said. The move was not immediately matched by American Airlines or United Airlines, where credits are set to expire March 31 and Dec. 31, respectively. Passengers are entitled to refunds under federal law if the airline cancels their flight. But if the passenger cancels, airlines generally provide only some form of credit or voucher, typically with a one-year expiration. Refunds have become a major source of airline consumer complaints to the US DoT. Congress is considering legislation that would require airlines to cover lodging, meals and other costs that consumers incur when airlines cancel their flight.<br/>

Air France-KLM’s board has begun a search to replace the head of its Dutch arm in a move that could give CEO Ben Smith a fresh start in improving relations between its two flag carriers. “Pieter Elbers will not enter into a third term as CEO and president of KLM,” the group said Thursday. “This enables the supervisory board of KLM to start a thorough process for a successor in a timely manner.” Elbers has had a tenuous hold on the job for some time due to his at-times troubled relations with Smith, who has sought to carry out reforms that would make the French and Dutch sides of the group cooperate more effectively. The KLM chief survived a showdown two years ago only after Smith was handed greater governance powers. While Elbers said in a separate statement from KLM that he’s “handing over the baton,” it’s not clear whether he’ll finish his term, which ends on May 1, 2023. Air France-KLM has survived the pandemic on successive bailouts from both France and the Netherlands, with the French emerging as the biggest shareholder with a 29% stake. The newfound dominance has gone some way in quelling infighting between the two sides. The countries and carriers have often been at odds since the 2004 merger of their respective national airlines, with the Dutch arm long resenting French control. Air France also has weaker profitability than KLM and history of labor conflict.<br/>