Southwest Airlines is the largest domestic air carrier in the United States by passengers boarded. Southwest operates nearly 800 aircraft in an all-Boeing 737 fleet. Despite offering some longer routes and a few perks for business travelers, the airline predominantly specializes in short-haul, leisure flights operated in a single, open-seating cabin configuration in a point-to-point network. In late 2025, Southwest will modify its cabins to offer some seats with extra legroom and will update its ticketing process and merchandising to offer assigned seats and more fare categories including a basic economy class that will more directly compete with other airlines' offerings.

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Southwest Airlines is a low-fare, low-cost airline based in Dallas. It has more than 56,000 employees and serves 103 destinations in the U.S. and 10 other countries. Its fleet is comprised mainly of Boeing 737s. The company has approximately 750 aircraft, making it the world's largest operator of single-aisle planes. It generated revenue of $27.6 billion in 2024.

Recession Clues How close is the U.S. economy to a recession? This week is jam-packed with clues, as economic data pours in and earnings reports continue at peak volume. Last week, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 2.5%, the S&P 500 was up 4.6%, and the Nasdaq rose 6.7%. All three indices are still negative for the year to date, with the Dow and the S&P 500 down 6%, and the Nasdaq off 10%. The earnings calendar includes Domino's Pizza and MGM Resorts on Monday; Starbucks, Coca-Cola, Bookings Holdings, UPS, and Visa on Tuesday; Microsoft, Meta Platforms, Caterpillar, and GE HealthCare on Wednesday; Apple, Amazon, McDonald's, CVS, Airbnb, and Eli Lilly on Thursday; and Chevron and Exxon and Friday. So far, 36% of S&P 500 companies have reported and earnings for the quarter are up 10% from the prior-year quarter. That is above the consensus call for EPS growth of about 3%-8% and follows 17% growth in 4Q24 and 9% growth in 3Q24 (according to LSEG). Healthcare currently is the leading sector, up 39%, and Energy is at the bottom, down 18%. For 2025, our full-year earnings estimate is for low-double-digit growth from 2024. On the economic calendar, the Personal Consumption Expenditures Index (on inflation) and the latest update on GDP are both due on Wednesday. Other releases of note are Nonfarm Payrolls on Friday, Personal Income on Wednesday, and ISM Manufacturing on Thursday. The Economic Call of the Week from Argus' Chief Economist Chief Graja, CFA, is that we likely will not be forecasting for a recession after all the data comes in. For Nonfarm Payrolls, our estimate is for an increase of 130,000 and the consensus is about the same. A month-over-month decline would be a recession warning. We do not expect a year-over-year decline in the total number of workers on establishment payrolls, but that would also be a warning. Some might be concerned if the year-over-year increase is less than 1%. Turning to Personal Income, the year-over-year change excluding transfer receipts could be a very important number. We believe this is one of the indicators that the National Bureau of Economic Research Recession Committee watches very closely. Growth has been declining. It was 1.13% in February down from 3.28% last March. We would be happy if growth stays above 1.1% or even 1%. A decline would be a concern. And finally, our forecast for ISM Manufacturing is for an index value of 48.6. The consensus is 47.9. A decline to 42.3 would be a concern, but a reading below this level would likely need to be in place for several months to provide a recession warning in the absence of other clear signals. Turning to other important data, the Atlanta Fed GDPNow measure now forecasts a decline of 2.5% for 1Q, signaling contraction. We recently lowered our forecast for GDP and now expect expansion of 1.4% in 1Q and 1.3% for all of 2025. The Cleveland Fed Inflation Nowcast is now at 2.4% for CPI in April, in-line with the March rate. Mortgage rates ticked down two basis points (bps) last week, with the average 30-year fixed-rate mortgage now at 6.81%, according to FreddieMac. Gas prices fell three cents to an average of $3.14 per gallon for regular gas. The next Fed rate decision is on May 7, with odds at 10% for a rate cut, according to the CME FedWatch rate tool. The next meeting after that is on June 18, when odds jump to 63% for a cut. We continue to forecast two 25 bps rate cuts in 2025, both in the back half of the year.