American Airlines parent AMR narrows first-quarter loss

Wednesday, April 19th 2006, 12:18 pm

By: News On 6

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) _ American Airlines parent AMR Corp. on Wednesday reported a narrower loss for the first quarter as passenger and cargo revenue grew from the prior year. Its shares rose 7 percent.

Losses totaled $92 million, or 49 cents per share, for the January-March period compared with a loss of $162 million, or $1 per share, a year earlier. Revenue rose 13 percent to $5.34 billion from $4.75 billion in the prior-year period.

The results came in well ahead of Wall Street expectations. Analysts polled by Thomson Financial forecast a loss of 78 cents per share on $5.21 billion in revenue.

AMR said it paid $349 million more for fuel than it did a year ago.

Shares of AMR rose $1.68 to $25.50 in midday trading on the New York Stock Exchange. Over the past 52 weeks, the stock has traded between $9.80 and $29.14, and is up nearly 15 percent for the year.