QFinsider, some interesting observations, but for what its worth, this is really about using the current climate to gain a bit more lolly for Qantas.
Peter Gregg said at the half yearly announcement that 94 per cent of fuel for the financial year ending June this year had been hedged (I can't recall at what amount but US$70 seems to be about right). A significant amount of the next year's fuel has also been hedged. Now, granted that they are still paying for some fuel at spot prices which are much higher, if most of your costs are fixed at a lower price, then why increase the cost of tickets?
The answer is to deliver that nice increase in profit which GD says he will still do at the end of the year.
JQ are in the position where they are really waiting to see what Tiger does, or they are just hoping to build it into the yield management system and assume that nobody notices. For all the conspiracies about not paying for fuel etc, I can see that its more logical, given that they are in the elastic end of the market, to wait and see before making a move.