American Airlines echoes Delta in warning of demand slowdown

American Airlines is seeing a slowdown in demand because of surging coronavirus cases, signaling a weaker outlook heading into the year-end holidays. After a strong start for Q4, a deceleration in net bookings growth began before Thanksgiving and has persisted into this month, American said in a regulatory filing Friday. As a result, the company expects its daily cash consumption to be at the high end of an earlier forecast of $25m to $30m. The company’s caution follows a similar warning Thursday by Delta, which said it may burn more cash than expected in Q4 because of the slowdown. While passenger totals jumped over the Thanksgiving holiday, they were still only about 40% of last year’s levels. American said it expects to end the year with more than $14b in liquidity.<br/>