Topic: Growth Stocks

Stock Pickers Digest Hotline – Friday, March 4, 2011

Article Excerpt

WESTJET AIRLINES, $15.48, symbol WJA on Toronto, has just signed a code-sharing agreement with American Airlines. Under these agreements, two airlines co-operate on flights and baggage handling. Last year, WestJet entered into its first code-sharing deal with Cathay Pacific. Initially, WestJet will only connect with American Airlines flights to Chicago and Boston. However, it expects to eventually connect with American Airlines flights that go all across the U.S. Code-sharing agreements are especially valuable for attracting business passengers. That’s because these agreements let customers seamlessly connect between flights and gain frequent-flyer points for the entire distance travelled. Separately, WestJet reports that its load factor rose to a record 83.6% in February 2011 from 82.5% in February 2010. Load factor is the percentage of available seats that are occupied by paying passengers. More important, the load factor rose even though the company raised its capacity by 10.7%, to meet higher demand. Revenue passenger miles (the total number of paying passengers on each plane multiplied…