United offers dual full-year outlooks: One for a normal year and one for a recession

The second of the big four US carriers to drop its results, United Airlines, reported first-quarter earnings after the bell Tuesday. Its shares surged more than 6% in after-hours trading.

United reported a profit of $387 million, and its adjusted earnings per share of $0.91 beat estimates.

Unlike its rivals Delta Air Lines and Frontier, United did offer full-year guidance amid rough industry turbulence caused by tariffs and tariff-related slowdowns in travel and discretionary spending.

In fact, oddly enough, it offered two.

In a stable economic environment, United said it expects adjusted earnings per share of between $11.50 and $13.50 this fiscal year, the same outlook it gave in January. In a recessionary environment, United expects to earn between $7 and $9.

Explaining the dual outlooks, United said:

“A single consensus no longer exists, and therefore the Company’s expectation has become bimodal — either the US economy will remain weaker but stable, or the US may enter into a recession. The Company is therefore providing two separate guidance benchmarks based on these two different macroeconomic views.”

Meanwhile, United’s quarterly revenue of $13.2 billion came in slightly below analyst estimates. United said it flew 40.8 million customers in the quarter, up from the same period last year. Passenger revenue climbed nearly 5% in the same time frame to $11.9 million.

Airline execs have repeatedly expressed their displeasure with tariffs — even if they don’t always used the word itself. Delta CEO Ed Bastian last week warned that the US will “probably end up in a recession” if trade uncertainty continues. In February, Airbus CEO Guillaume Faury called them a “lose-lose” for the industry. Both Delta and Ryanair have said they won’t accept deliveries of tariff-inflated planes.

Prior to trade war turbulence, US carriers were feeling wildly optimistic about this year. United was coming off a Q4 profit record of $985 million and Delta said it expected 2025 to be its best financial year in a century.

Instead, the big four airlines — which, including regional partners, control 80% of the US market — have shed roughly $33 billion in market cap combined year to date. Last week, Goldman Sachs lowered its outlook for the entire US industry. According to data from the US International Trade Administration, arrivals to the US from all overseas origins fell nearly 12% in March.