Q1 EPS Forecast for Southwest Airlines Lowered by Analyst

Southwest Airlines Co. (NYSE:LUV) – Equities research analysts at Zacks Research dropped their Q1 2025 EPS estimates for shares of Southwest Airlines in a report issued on Tuesday, December 17th. Zacks Research analyst S. Goswami now forecasts that the airline will post earnings per share of $0.01 for the quarter, down from their prior forecast of $0.03. The consensus estimate for Southwest Airlines’ current full-year earnings is $0.78 per share. Zacks Research also issued estimates for Southwest Airlines’ Q2 2025 earnings at $0.81 EPS, FY2025 earnings at $1.40 EPS, Q2 2026 earnings at $0.84 EPS, Q3 2026 earnings at $0.30 EPS and FY2026 earnings at $2.22 EPS.

LUV has been the topic of several other reports. Evercore ISI raised shares of Southwest Airlines from an “in-line” rating to an “outperform” rating and increased their price objective for the company from $30.00 to $35.00 in a research report on Tuesday, September 3rd. Jefferies Financial Group upgraded shares of Southwest Airlines from an “underperform” rating to a “hold” rating and raised their price objective for the stock from $24.00 to $32.00 in a research report on Wednesday, October 9th. Sanford C. Bernstein boosted their price objective on Southwest Airlines from $30.00 to $33.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a report on Wednesday, December 11th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their target price on Southwest Airlines from $20.00 to $26.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, October 25th. Finally, BNP Paribas upgraded Southwest Airlines to a “strong sell” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 19th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, twelve have assigned a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $31.37.

Southwest Airlines Stock Up 1.5 %

LUV stock opened at $33.28 on Friday. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $31.92 and its 200 day simple moving average is $29.45. Southwest Airlines has a 1-year low of $23.58 and a 1-year high of $36.12. The firm has a market capitalization of $19.96 billion, a PE ratio of -475.43, a PEG ratio of 7.38 and a beta of 1.16. The company has a current ratio of 0.88, a quick ratio of 0.83 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.49.

Southwest Airlines (NYSE:LUV) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 24th. The airline reported $0.15 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.05 by $0.10. Southwest Airlines had a positive return on equity of 4.56% and a negative net margin of 0.06%. The firm had revenue of $6.87 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $6.77 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.38 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 5.3% compared to the same quarter last year.

Southwest Airlines Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, January 16th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, December 26th will be paid a dividend of $0.18 per share. This represents a $0.72 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.16%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, December 26th. Southwest Airlines’s payout ratio is -1,028.57%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, insider Linda B. Rutherford sold 3,849 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, December 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $34.40, for a total value of $132,405.60. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 89,376 shares in the company, valued at $3,074,534.40. This represents a 4.13 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, major shareholder Elliott Investment Management sold 1,203,920 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, October 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $29.83, for a total transaction of $35,912,933.60. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 59,912,580 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,787,192,261.40. This represents a 1.97 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.33% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Southwest Airlines

A number of institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of LUV. Principal Financial Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of Southwest Airlines by 3.3% during the 3rd quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 689,199 shares of the airline’s stock valued at $20,421,000 after acquiring an additional 21,805 shares during the period. Inspire Trust Co. N.A. raised its holdings in shares of Southwest Airlines by 23.6% during the third quarter. Inspire Trust Co. N.A. now owns 99,407 shares of the airline’s stock valued at $2,945,000 after purchasing an additional 19,000 shares during the period. Franklin Resources Inc. increased its position in Southwest Airlines by 46.2% in the 3rd quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 30,082,719 shares of the airline’s stock valued at $932,894,000 after buying an additional 9,504,201 shares in the last quarter. Sfmg LLC acquired a new position in Southwest Airlines during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $1,057,000. Finally, Sanctuary Advisors LLC boosted its holdings in Southwest Airlines by 32.9% in the third quarter. Sanctuary Advisors LLC now owns 65,831 shares of the airline’s stock worth $2,105,000 after acquiring an additional 16,293 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 80.82% of the company’s stock.

Southwest Airlines Company Profile

Southwest Airlines Co operates as a passenger airline company that provides scheduled air transportation services in the United States and near-international markets. As of December 31, 2023, the company operated a total fleet of 817 Boeing 737 aircraft; and served 121 destinations in 42 states, the District of Columbia, and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, as well as ten near-international countries, including Mexico, Jamaica, the Bahamas, Aruba, the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Belize, Cuba, the Cayman Islands, and Turks and Caicos.