Tiger always was about payback
Do you blokes recall the circumstances in which Tiger originally came to our shores? It was right after Dixon, Joyce & Co at Qantas decided that they would own Singapore with their idiotic JetStar Asia idea (one that has been an open wound ever since, money wise).
Tiger was an ancilliary holding of Temasek holdings, the investment arm of the Singapore government. Tiger was a bitch slap to Qantas for Jetstar.
Fast forward a few years after Tiger shot off both of its own feet courtesy of local managers even more tone deaf than Joyce. After years of losses and being unable to game either the public or CASA, Tiger was in trouble. Enter Virgin, who, under Borghetti, wasn't above continuing the Qantas hubris therapy, albeit on a more limited scale.
I do not think that Tiger was ever planned to make a huge profit or be self-sustaining: it was a strategic move in the both the market place and the head space of its competitors. It continues to be so, but now the losses are getting serious. (Along with, I suspect, Jetstar's. But the JQ P&L situation can only be surmised)
I don't think that anyone of the two players/four brands are making money right now...a hangover from the market share wars and the 65% petard upon which Joyce has hoist Qantas/JQ. The current truce on that front may help that a bit for Virgin and Qantas, but not their LCC offshoots in the near term. Fares and traffic are both too low everywhere right now for that.