Virgin Australia quarterly statement looks good

Virgin Australia today confirmed that net profit for the six months to December 31, 2011, came in at $51.8m, up 118% from $23.8m in the same period a year before. Virgin Australia chief executive John Borghetti stated that the impact Qantas’ grounding had on Virgin’s profit was in the low single digit millions. “The [Qantas] grounding was for only a very short period of time and while we did enjoy an uptick in our business, we have to continue to work hard to win lasting market share gains,” he said. Virgin said underlying profit before tax – the airline’s preferred