Delta’s plan to exit bankruptcy approved

A federal bankruptcy judge approved Wednesday a Delta Air Lines Inc. plan to exit bankruptcy after the nation’s third-largest airline spent nearly 20 months in a wrenching reorganization that cut 6,000 jobs and slashed $3 billion in costs.

Atlanta-based Delta expects to emerge from court protection Monday. It estimates it will be worth $9.4 billion to $12 billion, after it had reduced labor costs, restructured its fleet and terminated a pilots pension plan.

More than 95% of Delta’s creditors voted to endorse its plan to leave bankruptcy as a stand-alone carrier. That plan had been put in jeopardy by a $9.8-billion hostile takeover bid launched last fall by Tempe, Ariz.-based US Airways Group Inc. Delta persuaded creditors to back its blueprint to emerge from bankruptcy and reject the buyout offer.

Now that it is leaving court protection, Delta may sell off its regional carrier subsidiary, Cincinnati-based Comair, which has received poor marks for lost baggage and flight delays.

Delta’s board will also choose a successor to Chief Executive Gerald Grinstein, who plans to retire.

Grinstein, 74, has said the two leading internal candidates were Chief Financial Officer Ed Bastian and Chief Operating Officer James Whitehurst.

Delta will celebrate its emergence Monday in Atlanta. Shares in the reorganized Delta, with the ticker symbol DAL, are scheduled to begin trading again Wednesday on the New York Stock Exchange.

Delta’s reorganization plan will give unsecured creditors between 62% and 78% of the value of their allowed claims as shares of new Delta stock.