United Airlines Says Boeing’s Midair Blowout, Max 9 Grounding Cost It $200 Million

United Airlines is blaming troubled plane maker Boeing for a $200 million hit to its earnings in the first three months of this year after a midair blowout led to the grounding of many of its Max 9 planes.

In its first-quarter 2024 financial results published on April 16, the company said it had a pretax loss of $164 million, which marked a $92 million improvement over the same quarter last year.

The Chicago, Illinois-headquartered airline said those earnings “reflect the approximately $200 million impact from the Boeing 737 MAX 9 grounding, without which the company would have reported a quarterly profit.”

Still, the first-quarter loss was narrower than expected by Wall Street, and United’s shares rose by roughly 6 percent in after-hours trading.

“United delivered strong financial and operational performance in the quarter,” the company said. “The demand environment remained strong with a double-digit percentage increase in business demand quarter over quarter, as compared to pre-pandemic. Additionally, the company was able to take advantage of a number of opportunities to adjust domestic capacity which drove meaningful improvements in first quarter profitability.”

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