The American Dream, RIP? (The Economist)

New ADS: Volaris, A Discount Airline From Mexico

Posted by David Hunkar on 21 September 2013, 12:09 pm

Mexico-based ultra-low-cost airline Controladora Vuela Compañia de Aviación, S.A.B. or Volaris (VLRS) listed its American Depositary Shares (ADSs) on the NYSE on September 18, 2013. The company priced the IPO at $12.00 per ADS for a total of about 26 million shares. Each ADS represents 10 ordinary shares.

Here is a brief overview of Volaris:

The company was first formed in 2003 to serve the Mexican market.
The first flight flew from Toluca to Tijuana in March, 2006.
Today the airline operates 80 routes in Mexico and the U.S. with about 43 aircraft.
Volaris operates 203 flight segments daily on routes that connect 30 cities in Mexico and 10 cities in the United States.

After opening at $12.76 on listing day the stock closed at $13.83 on Friday. Investors may want to keep an eye on Volaris as the Mexican economy is performing better and the company has lots of potential for growth.

More information can be found on the investor relations site here.

Some of the other Latin American airlines that trade on the NYSE include Panama-based Copa Airlines (CPA), GOL Linhas (GOL)and Chilean airline LATAM Airlines Group S.A.(LFL).

Disclosure: No Positions

Update: MTR Corporation, Hong Hong’s Metro Train Operator

Posted by David Hunkar on 21 September 2013, 9:59 am

In January 2012, I wrote a short article on MTR Corporation, the leading railway operator in Hong Kong. Compared to the subway systems in places like London, New York and Washington DC, MTR seems to the best. The Tube in London is clean but expensive. The DC subway system is clean but stupidly complex with its weird fare system. Many would agree that the morons that came up with the fare system in DC are third-rate crooks just like the politicians that infest that great city above. It is a disgrace that the nation’s capital metro is so pathetic. The New York subway is very cheap to get around with good connections but it is dirty and many stations look like dark dungeons. The system badly needs a complete makeover top to bottom.

The Wall Street Journal recent published an interesting article on the Hong Kong metro train operator. From the article:

MTR stands apart from its rivals for other reasons. The company is publicly traded and consistently profitable without any direct government support. Those earnings come from another unique characteristic: MTR profits from developing the land above and around its stations, allowing it to benefit from Hong Kong’s booming real-estate market. That land comes from the Hong Kong government, amounting to an indirect subsidy.

The rail operator is 77%-controlled by the government, meaning it is ultimately owned by Beijing, though Hong Kong retains its own government and legal system. MTR made an underlying profit of 4.25 billion Hong Kong dollars (US$548 million) in the first half of 2013, up 5.1% from a year earlier. Just 10% of the profit came from overseas.

MTR’s biggest selling point is its own operations. It has consistently delivered a 99.9% on-time rate while carrying 5.1 million people on an average weekday, ranking it as the world’s 10th-busiest subway system. Despite a relatively modest scale, with tracks spanning about 120 miles, it carries roughly the same number of people as systems in London and New York, which have more than 200 miles of track.

The trains are clean and appear as often as every two minutes at major stations during rush hour. In the past year, MTR added 1,200 train trips a week to ease crowding, a chronic complaint.

Source: Hong Kong’s Subway System Wants to Run the World, The Wall Street Journal, Sept 18, 2013

MTR trades on the OTC market as an unsponsored ADR with the ticker MTRJY. On Friday the stock closed at $39.51.

Click to enlarge

Hong Kong Metro Map (Source: MTR Site)