US Airways Group rises 1.3% on below average volume

STOCKS

US Airways Group (LCC.N), NYSE's 8th largest airlines company by market capitalisation, rose 7.0c (or 1.3%) to close at US$5.59. Compared with the NYSE U.S. 100 index, which rose 24.3 points (or 0.4%) on the day, this was a relative price change of 0.8%. The volume was 0.8 times average trading of 6,834,443 shares.

PRICE VOLUME DYNAMICS

Volatility: the stock traded between an intraday low of US$5.54 and ten-day high of US$5.73, suggesting a trading opportunity between peaks and troughs. The average daily volatility of 4.4% places the stock in the 1st quartile in the market meaning it is highly volatile.

Volume and turnover period: there were 5,170,000 shares worth US$28.9 million traded. The turnover rate in the 12 months to date was 10.5% (or a turnover period of 9 years 5 months).

% Premium to low: the last price is at a premium of 12.9% to the 12-month low of US$4.95 one month ago on 08 Aug, 2011.

Volume weighted price (VWP): the price is at a premium of 1.3% to the 1-month volume weighted average price (VWP) of US$5.519. Given that this premium has exceeded 1.3% fifty times and been under 1.3% eleven times in the last year, the upside:downside probability is estimated at 50:11 or 4.5:1.

Falls to Rises: In the last three months the number of falls outnumbered rises 40:24 or 1.67:1.

Beta: The Beta of this stock is 0.73. A Beta lower than 1 suggests this is a low risk, low return stock with volatility less than that of the market.

Standard Deviation (SD): SD is a statistical measure of deviation from the mean. The SD of 3.3% gives it a percentile rank of 80 meaning that 80% of stocks in the NYSE market are less volatile than this stock.

Trailing month: in the last 21 trading sessions there has been a net decline of 5.25%; the stock has retreated 19 times and the biggest one day decline was 10% on Aug 08.

OPEN INTEREST TREND AND INTERPRETATION

Open interest hit a Nine-day high.

Same day trend: open interest rose for a fourth consecutive day. Open interest rose 0.5% from 83,102 to 83,516. Combined with the price rising 1.3% this suggests the market is strong.

Trailing one week trend: Open interest climbed 4.5% from 79,909 a week ago while the stock soared 10.0% from US$5.30 a week ago. Combined with the rising price this also suggests the market is strong.

Trailing one month trend: open interest soared 15.6% from 72,275 a month ago while the stock slumped 6.2% from US$5.98 a month ago. Combined with the falling price this suggests the market is weak.

Open interest as % of issued capital: 8,351,600 shares, representing 5.2% of the issued capital.

[ranked 114 out of 611 stocks in descending order]

2011 Open interest: 46,771 contracts, representing 56.0% of total.

2012 to 2013 Open interest: 36,745 contracts, representing 44.0% of total.

Put:call ratio: open interest contracts on exchange traded options included 45,827 put contracts and 37,689 call contracts.

The put:call ratio was 1.2, down 1.0% for the day, up 11.9% in the past week and down 7.9% in the past month.

Top three traded call options [1 contract is 100 shares]

Exercise US$6.0; Expires Sep 17: 18.0c up 28.6%; volume 1572

Exercise US$6.0; Expires Dec 17: 69.0c up 3.0%; volume 69

Exercise US$7.0; Expires Oct 22: 18.0c up 5.9%; volume 45

Top three traded put options [1 contract is 100 shares]

Exercise US$5.0; Expires Sep 17: 11.0c down 15.4%; volume 83

Exercise US$8.0; Expires Sep 17: US$2.31 down 8.3%; volume 29

Exercise US$4.0; Expires Sep 17: 5.0c up 25.0%; volume 28

Access comprehensive Stock Research on http://www.buysellsignals.com/19611498

PRICE PERFORMANCE RANK IN INDEX AND SECTORS

The stock is in 1 index and 2 sectors.

The following index and sectors rose setting the trend for its rise of 1.3%:

The Total NYSE Market of 1926 stocks and 46 units traded today, which was up 37.7 points or 0.6% to 6,309.8,

NYSE U.S. 100 index which was up 24.3 points or 0.4% to 5,379.0,

Airlines sector of 11 stocks traded today, which was up 0.3 points or 0.01% to 5,022.

RELATIVE VALUATION INDICATORS [RVI] FUNDAMENTAL ANALYSIS

The stock meets the following value criteria set by Benjamin Graham:

-"A P/E ratio down to less than four-tenth of the highest average P/E ratio the stock attained in the most recent five years"; the P/E of 1.8 is 0.09 times the highest average P/E of 19.0 reached on Apr 24, 2007.

The stock has a score of 5 out of 9 set by Joseph Piotroski [pass mark >=5 ]:

Positive net income; Positive operating cashflow; Good quality of earnings [operating cashflow exceeds net income]; Improvement in current ratio from 0.84% to 1.02%; Improvement in asset turnover [growth in revenue of 13.86% exceeded growth in assets of 4.9%].

Other Bullish Signals:

- Price/Earnings of 1.8 versus sector average of 15.4 and market average of 16.2.

- Return on Assets of 6.4% versus sector average of 2.0% and market average of 2.2%.

Bearish Signals:

- Total Liabilities/ EBITDA of 7.2 is more than or equal to 5, this compares unfavourably with the Joseph Piotroski benchmark of 5.

- The average annual compound return on the share price in the last 5 years was -33.1%, underperforming the average annual compound return on the NYSE U.S. 100 index of -2.8%

RELATIVE VALUATION INDICATORS [RVI] TECHNICAL ANALYSIS

Bullish Signals:

- The price soared 10.0% in the last week.

- Compared with the NYSE U.S. 100 index which rose 2.8% for the week, this represented a relative price increase of 7.2% for the week.

Bearish Signals:

- The price slumped 6.2% in the last month.

- This has been exacerbated by firm volume of 1.2 times average for the month.

- Compared with the NYSE U.S. 100 index which fell 5.6% for the month, this represented a relative price decrease of 0.6% for the month.

- In the NYSE market of 1,929 stocks and 46 units traded today, the stock has a 6-month relative strength of 18 indicating it is trailing 82.0% of the market.

- The price to 50-day EMAP ratio is 0.9, a bearish indicator. In the past 200 days this ratio has been under 0.9 33 times suggesting further downside. The 50-day EMAP has decreased to US$6.454. A decrease is another bearish indicator.

- The Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD) indicator of 12-day Exponential Moving Average (EMA) minus the 26-day EMA is negative suggesting a bearish signal.

- In the last three months the stock has hit a new 52-week low fourteen times, pointing to a significant downtrend.

- The price to 200-day MAP ratio is 0.63, a bearish indicator. In the past 200 days this ratio has been under 0.63 18 times suggesting further downside. The stock is trading below both its MAPs and the 50-day MAP of US$6.715 is lower than the 200-day MAP of US$8.844, a bearish indicator. The 200-day MAP has decreased to US$8.844. A decrease is another bearish indicator.

SHAREHOLDER RETURNS

Trailing one week: the stock rose three times (60% of the time) and fell twice (40% of the time). The volume was 0.8 times average trading of 34,172,215 shares. The value of US$1,000 invested a week ago is US$1,049 [vs US$1,028 for the NYSE U.S. 100 index], for a capital gain of US$49(or rise of 4.9%).

Trailing one month: the stock fell thirteen times (57% of the time) and rose ten times (43% of the time). The volume was 1.2 times average trading of 150,357,746 shares. The value of US$1,000 invested a month ago is US$938 [vs US$946 for the NYSE U.S. 100 index], for a capital loss of US$62(or loss of 6.2%).

Trailing one year: the value of US$1,000 invested one year ago is US$618 [vs US$1,158 for the NYSE U.S. 100 index], for a capital loss of US$382. The total return to shareholders for 1 year is -38.2%.

Trailing five years: the value of US$1,000 invested five years ago is US$134, for a capital loss of US$866.

The present value of US$1000 invested at a previous date is shown below:

FINANCIALS

Quarterly Report; year-on-year comparisons with previous corresponding period:

In the quarter to June 30, 2011 total revenue was up 10.5% to US$3.5 billion; net profit slumped 67.5% to US$91 million; EPS of 57.0c.

Annual Report for the year ended December 31, 2010 (year-on-year comparisons with previous corresponding period)-

Total liabilities to Total assets of 1.0.

Favourable Changes: total liabilities to EBITDA down 72.2% to 7.2. While this compares unfavourably with the Joseph Piotroski benchmark of <5, the trend is favourable; although the Total Liabilities to Operating Cash Flow ratio of 9.6 also compares unfavourably with the Joseph Piotroski benchmark of <4, it had improved by 92.7% from the previous year.; current ratio up 21.4% to 1.0; Sales to total assets up 8.6% to 1.5.

Major Common Size Ratios: fixed assets to total assets down from 49.6% to 48.5%; total current assets to total assets up from 31.3% to 37.2%; cash to total assets up from 17.4% to 23.8%; other non-current assets to total assets down from 19.1% to 14.2%; intangibles to total assets down from 6.7% to 6.1%; EBITDA to Sales up from 2.9% to 9.1%; EBITD to Sales up from 2.9% to 9.1%; EBIT to Sales up from 0.6% to 7.0%.

MARKET SHARE

US Airways Group vs Airlines sector [Airlines sector Total in Brackets]

Net Profit of US$502 million [15.3% of aggregate sector net profit of US$3.3 billion; up from 10.8% in the previous year.]

EBIT of US$831 million [10.5% of aggregate sector EBIT of US$7.9 billion; up from 4.9% in the previous year.]

FUNDAMENTALS

ISSUED CAPITAL

Based on 161,533,000 issued equity shares the market capitalisation is US$903 million. It is NYSE's 6th largest Airlines company by total revenue.

ACTIVITIES

US Airways Group, Inc. (US Airways Group) is a holding company whose primary business activity is the operation of a network air carrier through its wholly owned subsidiaries, US Airways, Inc. (US Airways), Piedmont Airlines, Inc. (Piedmont), PSA Airlines, Inc. (PSA), Material Services Company, Inc. (MSC) and Airways Assurance Limited, LLC (AAL). Passenger revenues account for substantiall portion of the Company's operating revenues.

TOP MANAGEMENT

The chief financial officer is Derek J. Kerr and the chairman and chief executive officer is W. Douglas Parker.

REPORTED SELLING

Reported Selling:

September 14, 2010: US Airways Group insider sells

US Airways Group (LCC.N) insider Eberwein Elise R sold 1,025 shares worth approximately US$9,010 on September 10, 2010. The last price was USD8.87.

BUSINESS NEWS ROUND UP

The last 4 company announcements are:

August 26: US Airways Reduces East Coast Schedule in Anticipation of Hurricane Irene

[News Story] US Airways (NYSE: LCC) today announced that it is proactively canceling flights along the East Coast as a result of Hurricane Irene's projected path. Flight schedules at Washington Reagan, Philadelphia International Airport, New York's LaGuardia, John F. Kennedy and Newark airports and Boston Logan, as well as other cities in the Northeast and mid-Atlantic, will be reduced as the airline works to ensure the safety of its customers, employees and equipment.Customers are strongly encouraged to check flight status at usairways.com or by texting their flight number to TEXTUS before arriving at the airport.

July 18: Equity Research on US Airways Group Inc. and Delta Air Lines Inc. -- Major Airlines Dealing With Negative Flyer Sentiment

[News Story] NEW YORK, NY -- (MARKET WIRE) -- 07/18/11 -- www.shinesrooms.com has a handpicked team of market professionals with over 100 years of combined investing experience. Today they are providing members comprehensive research on the Major Airlines industry and are offering free analytical research on US Airways Group Inc.(NYSE: LCC) and Delta Air Lines Inc.(NYSE: DAL).

June 21: US Airways Announces $388 Million Aircraft Financing

[News Story] TEMPE, Ariz.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- US Airways, Inc. ("US Airways" or the "Company"), a wholly-owned subsidiary of US Airways Group, Inc. (NYSE: LCC) ("US Airways Group"), announced today its intention to make an offering, subject to market and other conditions, of Class A and Class B enhanced equipment trust certificates (the "Certificates") in the aggregate principal amount of approximately $388 million.

April 05: US Airways Reports March Traffic Results

[News Story] http://www.nasdaq.com/aspx/company-news-story.aspxstoryid=201104050900bizwire_usprx____bw5660&title=us-airways-reports-march-traffic-results Source: NASDAQ Stock Exchange

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