Mnuchin Vows Aid for U.S. Airlines to Fight Squeeze on Liquidity

(Bloomberg) -- Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said he has spoken with President Donald Trump and congressional leaders about addressing a “short-term liquidity issue” at U.S. airlines, which have lost almost half their value this year amid the coronavirus outbreak.

“The good news is the U.S. airline industry is in very good shape, it’s very efficient, and there’s a short-term liquidity issue that we’ll have to deal with,” Mnuchin told reporters at the White House on Friday.

“This isn’t a question of too big to fail or not too big to fail, it’s a question of if there’s short-term liquidity issues that impact lots of workers,” he said.

The challenge for the airline industry is that the virus has dried up demand, overwhelming the cost cutting and consolidation that followed surging jet-fuel prices and a rash of bankruptcies earlier this century. A Standard & Poor’s index of the biggest U.S. carriers plunged about 45% this year through Thursday after airlines pared flight schedules to match a pullback in travel.

Airlines staged a partial rebound Friday, with the stock gauge climbing 6% at 11:03 a.m. in New York. But the index was still down 19% on the week after tumbling Thursday by the most since just after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001.

CEO Meetings

Mnuchin said he had already met with airline bosses, though declined to identify which ones or say what they asked for. United Airlines Holdings Inc. said Chief Executive Officer Oscar Munoz has been in Washington this week to meet with government officials and lawmakers. Industry leaders at a JPMorgan Chase & Co. conference this week stressed that they can withstand the crisis.

Read more: American Air, Latam Face Credit-Downgrade Risk as Virus Spreads

The Treasury chief said he has spoken with Trump, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy about the need to support airlines.

“That’s something you can expect we’ll deal with quickly,” he said.

The airlines will benefit from a sharp drop in oil prices, Mnuchin said, assuming demand start to normalize later this year. Jet fuel prices have fallen by about half this year.

Mnuchin encouraged Americans not to cancel domestic travel.

“If I weren’t so busy working, I’d be going home to Los Angeles and I’d be perfectly comfortable getting on a commercial plane this weekend,” he said. “Despite the fact we’ve told people to shut down travel a little bit, people can travel in the domestic U.S.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Josh Wingrove in Washington at jwingrove4@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alex Wayne at awayne3@bloomberg.net, Justin Blum, Elizabeth Wasserman

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