AirCal Parent Earns $4 Million in 3rd Quarter

ACI Holdings, the parent company of AirCal, posted a net profit of $4 million for the third quarter--a 21.2% increase over net profit of $3.3 million for the comparable 1985 period.

But for the first nine months of the year, the company recorded a net loss of $6.2 million versus net profit of $14 million for the same period last year.

Third-quarter revenues for the Newport Beach-based company were $103.5 million--up 14% from $90.8 million in the third quarter of 1985. Revenues for the 1986 nine-month period were virtually unchanged from 1985, increasing only $3,400 to $271.5 million.

ACI was able to reduce its net loss for the period to $6.2 million through $2.4 million in non-operating income stemming from the disposal of the last of AirCal’s seven McDonnell Douglas MD-80 airplanes in the first quarter.

Disposal of the one MD-80 aircraft earned the company $3.8 million, said Bill Bell, a spokesman for ACI, but that figure was reduced to $2.4 million because of interest payments on debt. AirCal has switched to quieter Boeing 737-300 jets.

The company also posted a $609,000 non-operating loss in third quarter 1986 because of interest payments on debt.

Bell said the loss for the nine-month period was due to heavy fare discounting resulting in losses in the first and second quarters of 1986 and in the 1985 fourth quarter. Reductions in the number of heavily discounted fares and a drop in fuel costs were responsible for the third-quarter profit which, Bell said, “was nice to report for a change.”