Qantas back to basics
Geoff Easdown in today’s Herald-Sun rports that the Qantas board meets in Melbourne on Thursday under growing pressure to find a new way to access much-needed foreign cash.
The meeting, the first round-table discussion since the Airline Partners Australia buyout offer crashed last week, will concentrate on defining new strategies to fund aircraft purchases needed to spur growth.
The flying kangaroo’s need to access cheap foreign capital has never been greater, especially since APA will no longer be around to fulfill its promise of providing “patient capital” to buy new aircraft.
During the next five years, Qantas has to raise $18 billion to pay for 20 Airbus A380 super jumbos as well as an entire fleet of state-of-the-art Boeing 787 Dreamliners.
Qantas chairman Margaret Jackson and Geoff Dixon, the airline’s chief executive, have long argued that the airline should be allowed to operate like any other business and raise low-cost capital by issuing new stock to overseas investors.
Foreign ownership is a vexed issue at the moment for Qantas with the Federal Goverment demanding to know whether the foreign ownership cap was breached during APA’s failed takeover because of opportunistic trading in the carrier’s shares by international investors.
Qantas has acknowledged that it has been unable to reconcile the state of its share register and is yet to clarify the issue to the share market.
BusinessDaily understands the issue is high on Thursday’s board agenda.
Brent Mitchell, Shaw Stockbroking’s senior aviation analyst, said Qantas directors must move quickly to cancel or delist stocks that breached the government’s foreign ownership cap.
He argued that Ms Jackson and Qantas directors were vulnerable on the ownership issue.
He told BusinessDaily that the Qantas board “obviously failed” to police the 49% cap during the buyout process.
“She (Ms Jackson) might want to stay on, but there will be pressure for her to go especially if it is found that 65% of Qantas shares are now owned by foreigners,” he said.
“It is the board’s responsibility to enforce the Qantas Sale Act, and it (the board) obviously decided to overlook that because of the takeover.”
Report by The Mole
John Alwyn-Jones
Vegas’s Billion-Dollar Secrets – What They Don’t Want Tourists to Know
Visit Florida’s New CEO Bryan Griffin Shares His Vision for State Tourism with Graham
Chicago’s Tourism Renaissance: Graham Interviews Kristin Reynolds of Choose Chicago
Graham Talks with Cassandra McCauley of MMGY NextFactor About the Latest Industry Research
Destination International’s Andreas Weissenborn: Research, Advocacy, and Destination Impact
Graham and Don Welsh Discuss the Success of Destinations International’s Annual Conference
Graham and CEO Andre Kiwitz on Ventura Travel’s UK Move and Recruitment for the Role
Brett Laiken and Graham Discuss Florida’s Tourism Momentum and Global Appeal
Graham and Elliot Ferguson on Positioning DC as a Cultural and Inclusive Global Destination
Graham Talks to Fraser Last About His England-to-Ireland Trek for Mental Health Awareness
Kathy Nelson Tells Graham About the Honour of Hosting the World Cup and Kansas City’s Future
Graham McKenzie on Sir Richie Richardson’s Dual Passion for Golf and His Homeland, Antigua
ADS PRO 
France prepares for a massive strike across all transports on September 18
Turkish tourism stalls due to soaring prices for accommodation and food
CCS Insight: eSIMs ready to take the travel world by storm
Germany new European Entry/Exit System limited to a single airport on October 12, 2025
Airlines suspend Madagascar services following unrest and army revolt