Delta Air Lines yesterday reported a $652 million profit in the second quarter of the year, its first since the pandemic began and the latest sign that the airline recovery is well underway. The carrier reported $7.1 billion in revenue, the New York Times reported. There were also promising indications that the business is returning to normal, Delta said, noting that booking trends recovered as customers bought tickets further out, with average daily sales beating Delta’s internal expectations by 20 percent. “Domestic leisure travel is fully recovered to 2019 levels, and there are encouraging signs of improvement in business and international travel,” the airline’s chief executive, Ed Bastian, said. Corporate travel recovered as offices reopened throughout the quarter, with the number of business travelers down 60 percent in June compared with 80 percent in March, according to the airline. Despite those encouraging signs, Delta’s quarterly profit, which was buoyed by $1.5 billion in federal stimulus money, was still down 55 percent from the same quarter in 2019. Its revenue was down 43 percent from two years ago. The number of people flying for vacation or to visit friends and family within the United States has recovered to prepandemic levels, but Delta’s revenue from domestic travel was down 45 percent from 2019 because of the drop-off in business travel.
