I would say that I believe that Jetstar is the most profitable part of the Qantas Group because that is what the accounts say that have been released by the Qantas Group (a public company). What you are saying is that I should believe there is a massive fraud going on here and the numbers are being skewed, this is a serious charge.
I have absolutely no doubt that Qantas' financial reporting meets the accounting standards required by ASIC. But anywhere they can transfer costs within those constraints they will, because that helps them justify the direction they want to take the company.
For example, why does QF lease A320s to JQ? Why were QF crew sent to HKG/LHR to do their A330 courses (with accommodation and allowances) when QF sim time was used for JQ crew? Both of these things would affect mainline profits, but are not required to be disclosed in a financial report.
Also, don't forget that QF International
has performed well over the last decade. Even the years when profits were down (GFC, SARS, Iraq war) the commentary at the time was that it was still a good result as QF Int had outperformed the majority of its competitors. This quote is from QF's last half year report
Qantas improved yield by 9 per cent, and increased capacity by 3.3 per cent demonstrating a strong revenue recovery across both international and domestic business.
Yet here we are 6 months later, and it's the end of the world, and apparently it's been coming for a long time. So either something was wrong with QF's reporting over the last decade, or something's wrong with it now.
Dont forget, this is from the people that brought you:
- 200 hr pilots are safer
- Ongoing engine failures aren't a safety issue, 2 out of 1700 engineers using their left hands is
- QF pilots want a $200k payrise
So it doesn't take a great stretch of the imagination to believe that the numbers they release might be a bit skewed.
Jetstar is the most profitable part of the the Qantas Group at the moment, they are wholly owned by Qantas Group so are of course going to have 'investment' from the group.
Really? JQ Asia has lost a total of $80m since it was started, has only just recently made a profit of $6m, and has had its leasing arrangements with JQA questioned as it was believed that its leases were being used to prop up its profits (starting to see a pattern here?). How do you justify the $500m they are getting?