They aren't going to "sell the aircraft to China".. the aircraft Virgin own are so old the Chinese market wouldn't touch them.
The assets of value in Virgin are not it's aircraft, it's their slots, airport real estate, frequent flyer scheme, air operators certificate and route rights.
You can get newer second hand planes off the lessors.
And the other half of Virgin aircraft which are newer, are leased... From Bank of China.... The Chinese don't need to buy old 737s when they already own the new ones.
@Resolute7
I don't know if Singapore will come in. They've got to keep two airlines afloat, themselves and Vistara. They just started a full service airline JV out of India. Probably to fill the vacuum of Jet. The last thing they will do is spread themselves thin over 3 flailing airlines.
I don't think trans Pacific traffic will recover for a long time to the US. I think Asia will be a much quicker recovery. That's going off their responses to COVID19 compared to the US response. India is a much bigger market and more accessible to SIA. For them to put money into Virgin, the $5 billion in debt would have to be wiped out first and the operation restarted and reorganised to a much leaner and smaller operation. LAX SYD wouldn't be part of the new operation. SIA would lose interest on that alone.
If it were a small operation that wasn't going to cost much money, they'll probably throw something like $100 million or less at it, but nothing like billions when they have prop themselves and Vistara up. The risk ve reward just isn't there for them.
They're probably thinking some one else can be the fly in QANTAS' domestic ointment with their money. We're going to compete on our own turf, Asia, which will probably recover quicker and is a much larger market.
VAH Price at posting:
8.6¢ Sentiment: Sell Disclosure: Not Held
