Buckingham analyst Daniel McKenzie raised his price target for Alaska Air (ALK) to $88 from $78 and lowered his price target for American Airlines (AAL) to $42 from $43. He maintained Buy ratings on both airline names ahead of Q3 earnings this week. In a research note to investors, McKenzie says the industry is set to deliver Q3 pre-tax profits of $5.8B, up 16.5% year-over-year, primarily on top line revenue growth. The analyst believes Alaska Air, American Airlines, Hawaiian Holdings (HA) and JetBlue (JBLU) are most likely to outperform on revenue and EPS execution, while he thinks Spirit Airlines (SAVE) is the most likely to disappoint.

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JetBlue announced several leadership and organizational updates as the company continues on its path to sustained profitability: Daniel Shurz has been named JetBlue's new head of revenue, network, and enterprise planning. Over the past 20 years Shurz has served as vice president, network planning for Air Canada and senior vice president, commercial for Frontier Airlines, and held strategy and business development roles at both carriers. He will lead JetBlue's network planning, airline partnerships, sales and revenue management, and enterprise planning teams which are critical elements of the company's push for profitability and plans to strengthen its network positioning. Daniel will report to JetBlue's president, Marty St. George. Dave Clark has been named JetBlue's new head of finance and strategy, responsible for financial planning and analysis, strategy and business development, as well as investor relations. He joined JetBlue in 2009 and most recently served as JetBlue's head of revenue and planning. He will report to JetBlue's chief financial officer, Ursula Hurley. Shelly Griessel has been promoted to vice president, customer support. She joined JetBlue in 2022 and since then has served as managing director, customer support, responsible for JetBlue's omnichannel management of all customer contacts. She will continue to report to Jayne O'Brien, JetBlue's head of marketing and customer support. Melinda Maher has been named vice president, treasurer and infrastructure. She has served as vice president, financial planning & analysis and structural cost since 2022. She previously served on JetBlue's finance team from 2013-2016 before taking on leadership roles at Alaska Airlines and Amazon. Katherine Celli has been named vice president, culture, talent management, and organizational effectiveness. In addition to bolstering JetBlue's efforts around culture, a key competitive advantage, Katherine will have oversight of talent management and organizational effectiveness. She's been with JetBlue for 16 years, most recently as the culture and change management planning leader for the proposed Spirit integration. She will report to Tracy Lawlor, JetBlue's interim chief people officer.

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Bullish option flow detected in American Airlines with 26,130 calls trading, 3x expected, and implied vol increasing almost 2 points to 47.44%. 4/26 weekly 14.5 calls and Apr-24 14.5 calls are the most active options, with total volume in those strikes near 8,400 contracts. The Put/Call Ratio is 0.37. Earnings are expected on April 25th.

Unusual total active option classes on open include: Wrap Technologies (WRAP), AstraZeneca (AZN), JetBlue (JBLU), United Continental (UAL), Taiwan Semi (TSM), Nokia (NOK), EBay (EBAY), Maplebear Inc (CART), Airbnb (ABNB), and UnitedHealth (UNH).