Home Blog

₹7.5 Lakhs to ₹7 Crores Investments | Smart Investment Choices That Built Massive Wealth #investing



Discover how a ₹7.5 lakh investment grew into assets worth ₹7 crores through smart investment decisions, long-term planning, and wealth creation strategies.
In this video, we break down the investment choices, asset allocation, and financial decisions that contributed to this incredible wealth journey. Learn valuable lessons about investing, compounding, diversification, and building long-term wealth.

In this video:

₹7.5 Lakhs to ₹7 Crores journey
Investment portfolio breakdown
Real estate investments
Stocks & mutual funds
Wealth creation strategies
Lessons every investor can learn
Long-term investing mindset

📌 Subscribe for more finance, investing, and wealth creation content.

#Investing #WealthCreation #PersonalFinance #StockMarket #MutualFunds #FinanceWithYu #LongTermInvesting #Compounding #FinancialFreedom #Money

source

How To Close A Last-Minute Tuition Gap


It’s early August. The fall bill posted. You did the math, and you’re short… maybe by $2,000 or maybe by $20,000 (I hope not on that one).

This happens to a lot of families, and it happens for ordinary reasons. The financial aid package came in lower than the net price calculator suggested. Housing costs more than you budgeted. A scholarship you were counting on went to someone else. Or you simply didn’t add it all up until the invoice arrived with a number on it.

You have less time than you’d like, but you have more options than you think. The thing that determines whether this costs you a little or a lot is the order you work through them.

In partnership with Ascent Student Loans, here’s a guide on how to close a college funding gap so that you can enroll in classes on time. Check out Ascent Student Loans here >>

Would you like to save this?

We’ll email this article to you, so you can come back to it later!

First: Know Your Actual Number

Before you do anything else, know your numbers. Pull up the bill and work through it:

  1. Start with the school’s certified cost of attendance for the year, not just tuition. Housing, meals, fees, books, transportation.
  2. Subtract grants and scholarships.
  3. Subtract federal loans already offered in your student’s name.
  4. Subtract cash, 529 withdrawals, and anything else you’ve earmarked.
  5. Subtract Parent PLUS, if you’re using it, but read the next section first, because that number changed.

What’s left is the gap. Every decision from here should be sized to that number and nothing larger.

What Changed On July 1, 2026

If you were planning on a Parent PLUS loan absorbing the whole gap, run it again.

As of July 1, 2026, new Parent PLUS borrowers are capped at $20,000 per dependent student per year, and $65,000 total for that student’s undergraduate career. Before this change, Parent PLUS could go all the way up to the full cost of attendance. 

Some schools are even limiting the annual parent PLUS to $16,250 per year so families can stretch it out over 4 years.

Meanwhile, what a student can borrow federally in their own name hasn’t moved in more than a decade. For 2026–27, a dependent undergraduate is capped at $5,500 as a freshman, $6,500 as a sophomore, and $7,500 as a junior or senior, with a $31,000 lifetime aggregate.

Those two facts together are why more families than usual are staring at a gap this August. And with Parent PLUS loan rates 9.07% APR this year, shopping for a private loan with lenders like Ascent just makes sense.

The Order Of Operations

Work these in sequence. Steps one and two can reduce what you owe. Everything after that only finances it.

1. Appeal the aid package — this week

If your family’s financial situation has changed since you filed the FAFSA, you can ask the school to reconsider. It’s called an appeal, and financial aid offices grant them more often than families expect.

Qualifying circumstances typically include a job loss or significant income drop, a divorce or separation, high unreimbursed medical expenses, the death of a parent, or other circumstances. If the FAFSA snapshot no longer reflects reality, that’s the case you make.

Write a short, factual letter. State what changed, when, and what the financial impact is. Send it to the financial aid office directly and follow up by phone within three business days.

2. Keep searching for scholarships

Most large scholarship deadlines have passed for fall. But two things are often still live: departmental scholarships within your student’s major that get awarded late, and local scholarships from community foundations, employers, credit unions, and civic organizations, which frequently have summer deadlines and very few applicants.

The return per hour is high on small local awards specifically because almost nobody applies. It’s not going to close a $20,000 gap, but $1,500 you don’t borrow is $1,500 you don’t repay with interest.

3. Take the federal loan your student is offered

Accept the full Direct Loan amount, even if you plan to pay it down quickly. Federal loans carry income-driven repayment options and discharge protections that no private loan matches, and you can always pay them off early without penalty.

For 2026–27, Direct Unsubsidized loans for undergraduates are at 6.52% with a 1.057% origination fee.

If you’re going to use Parent PLUS, know that it’s at 9.07% for 2026–27 with a 4.228% origination fee — meaning a $20,000 PLUS loan disburses roughly $19,155 to the school. That fee is worth comparing against private options.

4. Then close what’s actually left

If you’ve done the first four steps and there’s still a gap, a private student loan is the reasonable tool for it.

One of the lenders we work with is Ascent. Their undergraduate loans go from $2,001 up to 100% of the school-certified cost of attendance, capped at $200,000 in total, with no application, origination, disbursement, late, or prepayment fees. You can check your rate in about three minutes with a soft credit check that doesn’t affect your credit score or your cosigner’s — so you can see a real number before you commit to anything. (Massachusetts residents have a higher $6,001 minimum.)

Whichever lender you use, three things matter more than the brand on the paperwork:

Apply with a cosigner. This is the single biggest lever on the rate a student will be offered. A parent or other creditworthy adult cosigning routinely produces a dramatically better rate than a student applying alone. Ascent lets students apply to release a cosigner after 12 consecutive on-time full principal-and-interest payments, once they can qualify on their own credit.

Choose the in-school payment option deliberately.
Ascent offers four — defer everything, pay interest only, pay a flat $25 a month, or pay full principal and interest. Deferring is the default and the most expensive, because interest accrues the entire time your student is enrolled. If you can cover the interest monthly during school, do it. Over four years it’s often a difference of thousands of dollars. Repayment terms run 5, 7, 10, 12, or 15 years.

Take Action Now

The most common way this goes wrong isn’t picking the wrong option — it’s starting too late.

Private student loans are school-certified, which means the financial aid office has to verify enrollment and cost before funds move. That step commonly takes one to three weeks, and it takes longer in the back-to-school crush.

If you’re needing to close that last minute financial aid gap, now’s the time to do it. Check out Ascent student loans and get a quote today. You can see your estimated rate in about 3 minutes online.

Get a quote from Ascent Student Loans >>

The post How To Close A Last-Minute Tuition Gap appeared first on The College Investor.

Fortune Tech: Nvidia’s creative capital; Apple’s political strategy, Google DeepMind drama


Good morning. Reporter Lily Mae Lazarus pinch hitting here today for Andrew.

Apparently, the PTA has a better portfolio than you.

Silicon Valley private schools are trading silent auctions for cap tables with a handful of Bay Area campuses now running miniature venture funds steered by parent-investors from Sequoia, Lightspeed, and Battery. The programs have become somewhat of Silicon Valley lore, Fortune’s Amanda Gerut writes. Saint Francis High School’s parent-run growth fund turned a $15,000 bet on Snap into roughly $34 million at IPO.

With SpaceX just pulling off the biggest IPO in history and Anthropic and OpenAI widely expected to follow, these school funds could be sitting on the next windfall.

Here’s what else moved tech and money today.

Want to send thoughts or suggestions to Fortune Tech? Drop a line here.

Nvidia wants your pension fund in the AI trade

Nvidia announced partnerships this week with Apollo, BlackRock, Blackstone, Brookfield, Goldman Sachs, and KKR to build financing platforms aiming to mobilize more than $500 billion for AI infrastructure—with the cash coming largely from “third-party investors” rather than Nvidia’s own balance sheet. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang framed it as treating AI compute like “productive infrastructure,” even offering residual-value support of up to 25% on some deals to sweeten the pitch.

Wall Street mostly likes it—Morgan Stanley and Bank of America both called Nvidia’s chips unusually financeable. But Stratechery’s Ben Thompson isn’t fully sold, warning it’s “a completely new nerve-racking thing to bring safety-seeking assets to bear” on a pile of GPUs. Eva Roytburg

Apple taps an airline lobbyist to run its D.C. relationship

Apple hired Nate Gatten (American Airlines’ head of government affairs since 2017, and a Republican with prior stints at JPMorgan and Fannie Mae) as its new vice president of government affairs, starting Aug. 31. He’ll report directly to Tim Cook

The hire may be Apple angling for a lobbyist who can align with the Trump administration. And it lands just weeks before Cook hands the CEO title to hardware chief John Ternus in September while staying on as executive chairman—a role in which he’s expected to also mingle with the D.C. crowd. Lily Mae Lazarus

Sergey Brin’s fingerprints on Google’s AI shakeup

Sergey Brin has reportedly spent months personally pushing Google DeepMind staff to move faster on Gemini, as Anthropic pulled ahead with its Claude Mythos preview, according to Reuters. Google allegedly delayed its next flagship, Gemini, by two months after internal testing showed its coding still lagged rivals. And last week’s shakeup handed day-to-day authority from DeepMind chief Demis Hassabis to his deputy, Koray Kavukcuoglu, who now has final say on major DeepMind decisions and reports to CEO Sundar Pichai.

The move marks a further erosion of DeepMind’s independence since Google bought the London lab in 2014, with some teams shifting into corporate Google. But other top talent—including Gemini’s original co-leads Jeff Dean and Oriol Vinyals—have headed out the door. —Lily Mae Lazarus

More tech

Vibe-coding startup Lovable raises $400 million at a $13.3 billion valuation, more than double its December price tag.

DeepSeek is quietly staffing up to challenge Anthropic’s Claude Code, posting job listings for a new AI-agent team.

Google’s newest wearables will track insulin resistance, a category first using AI and sensor data instead of continuous glucose monitoring.

Uber is quietly building a “tween” rides option for kids 10 to 12, based on code spotted in its latest iOS app.

New York City is probing Polymarket, Kalshi, Coinbase, and Titan over their ad practices, the latest legal headache for the booming prediction-markets industry.

Grubhub’s $23.8 million FTC settlement is finally reaching diners and drivers, with checks and PayPal payouts going to more than 640,000 people over misleading earnings claims and phantom restaurant listings.

Uber Freight is investigating a data breach claimed by hacking group Helix, which says it stole dispatch records and accounts payable files.

Trump Media is charging up to $100K a month for a head start on Truth Social posts, and nearly a dozen trading firms are already paying up—at least one economist is calling it insider trading.

Sam Altman says a Goldman Sachs internship “sounds unbelievably terrible now,” recalling the offer he turned down before founding OpenAI, which has since hired more than 100 ex-bankers itself.

UK Lawmakers Press Banks Over Restricted Services For Cryptocurrency Firms


A cross-party group of United Kingdom parliamentarians has formally challenged various banks over their reluctance to provide accounts and related services to companies focused on cryptocurrency and digital assets. The move highlights ongoing friction that industry participants say threatens the sector’s ability to expand within Britain.

On 11 August 2026, the co-chairs of the Crypto and Digital Assets All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG)Labour MP Gurinder Singh Josan CBE and Lord Vaizey of Didcot, a Conservative peer and former digital economy minister — sent a “Dear CEO” letter to the heads of the country’s largest lenders.

The correspondence seeks detailed explanations of each institution’s policies toward crypto and digital asset businesses.

The lawmakers reported receiving consistent accounts of firms encountering repeated obstacles when attempting to open or retain bank accounts.

They also noted that several high-street and challenger banks have imposed limits or outright bans on payments and transfers linked to cryptocurrency platforms.

Institutions frequently mentioned in connection with such restrictions include HSBC, Nationwide, NatWest, Santander UK and Starling Bank.

In the letter, the co-chairs described access to basic banking facilities as potentially “one of the single biggest barriers to growth” for UK-based crypto enterprises.

They expressed concern that restricted services could hinder the development of licensed firms and deter international companies from locating or investing in Britain.

This issue is viewed as particularly significant ahead of the full implementation of the UK’s new crypto regulatory framework, expected to become mandatory in 2027 under the oversight of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).

The APPG acknowledged that banks carry important legal and regulatory duties to combat financial crime and safeguard customers.

However, the group stressed that many digital asset companies argue decisions should rest on an individual firm’s risk profile rather than a blanket approach based solely on the sector.

Economic Secretary to the Treasury Lucy Rigby had earlier indicated that, once firms are authorised under the forthcoming regime, they should not face banking restrictions merely because of their industry affiliation.

This letter forms part of a broader parliamentary inquiry launched by the APPG in July 2026.

The inquiry is examining the scale of banking access difficulties, their effects on businesses and consumers, the drivers behind the restrictions, and whether additional measures are required.

Written evidence from banks, payment providers, fintechs, crypto firms and other stakeholders is being accepted until 31 August 2026, after which the group intends to publish findings and recommendations for government consideration.

Industry data has previously suggested that banks block or delay a substantial proportion of attempted transfers to crypto exchanges — estimates have placed the figure around 40 per cent in some surveys.

Supporters of clearer banking access argue that unnecessary barriers create friction for legitimate businesses, while banks typically cite consumer protection, fraud prevention and volatility risks as reasons for caution.

The APPG’s intervention underscores a wider debate about balancing financial crime safeguards with the government’s ambition to position the United Kingdom as a competitive hub for digital asset innovation.

By seeking transparency from lenders, parliamentarians hope to identify practical solutions that allow compliant crypto firms to operate effectively without compromising systemic integrity. As the inquiry progresses and the new regulatory regime approaches, the responses from banks will be closely watched for any signals of policy shifts that could ease the current constraints.



If AI disappoints? The transmission of US big-tech earnings news – Bank Underground


There is growing concern among policymakers, international organisations, and even big-tech Chief Executive Officers (exhibits I, II and III) that the current artificial intelligence (AI) boom features valuations increasingly detached from fundamentals. The Bank’s February 2026 Monetary Policy Report noted that an asset price correction is a key risk to the global economy, while the Bank’s July 2026 Financial Stability Report presented a scenario for how an AI correction could unfold. In this post, we study how negative big-tech earnings news transmits to global markets, which informed discussions around this scenario. We find that the effects ripple far beyond tech: equity indices decline, credit spreads widen and the US dollar depreciates. This last result, together with the limited response of Treasury yields, suggests muted flight-to-safety dynamics, unlike other financial stress episodes.

Why would an AI crash transmit differently from a typical financial shock? One reason may be that the current AI boom has been linked to expectations of greater economy-wide productivity, since the tech-sector is increasingly a leading engine of growth in the US. This view has been a key driver of private sector capital inflows into the US even as reserve managers have shied away from Treasuries since 2015. Should expected AI-driven productivity gains disappoint, investors may retreat from both US debt and equity markets. That would be a sharp departure from typical stress scenarios such as the 2008 global financial crisis in which heightened global risk aversion precipitated a flight-to-safety alongside a significant correction in (US) equity markets.

Empirical setup

To study how big-tech news transmits across markets, we construct a daily shock series around the earnings announcements of the Magnificent 7 US tech companies. These tech giants have grown to represent over one third of the S&P 500 index, reflecting, in part, their dominance in developing and scaling innovative technologies – most recently related to AI – which may render news disclosed at their earnings relevant for aggregate productivity as well as the broader index’s profitability. By focusing on narrow windows around their earnings announcements, this approach follows the standard logic of event studies. Our contribution is to construct a new series of Mag-7 earnings shocks capturing news intrinsic to these firms. This procedure helps to partial out the effects of aggregate shocks (eg, monetary policy) that would jointly influence big-tech firms’ earnings and asset markets, although news regarding how Mag-7 firms’ earnings load on these aggregate shocks could still be present.

Formally, our ‘Mag-7’ equity price shocks, defined in Equation (1) below, are constructed as the percentage change in the stock price of a given Mag-7 firm around its earnings announcement. The weight  on these changes is given by the firm’s share in the S&P 500 to control for the fact that their collective market capitalisations have risen from 3% to 35% of the S&P 500 over our sample. Since these firms report earnings after markets have closed, we measure the change between the closing price on earnings day and the opening price on the following day. If more than one firm announces earnings on the same day, we add them up.

εtMag7=jωt1j(Pricetj,openPricet1j,close1)(1)\varepsilon_t^{Mag7} = \sum\limits_j \omega^j_{t-1}\left(\frac{Price_t^{j,open}}{Price_{t-1}^{j,close}} – 1\right)\quad\quad\quad\quad\quad\quad(1)

Chart 1: Mag-7 equity price shocks

Source: Staff calculations.


Chart 1 plots our Mag-7 equity price shocks, which we construct from 2000 to the end of 2025. The shocks mostly lie between -0.5% and 0.5% and are larger after 2020, reflecting the Mag-7’s larger share in S&P 500 in recent years. By way of example, the largest negative shock in our sample occurred on 28 April 2022, when Amazon announced 2022 Q1 earnings that were significantly below market expectations. They also materially revised down their expected 2022 Q2 operating income. Together, these announcements led Amazon’s stock price to tumble by 10% in after-hours trading. This event triggered a significant market reaction. Despite Amazon constituting only about 3% of the S&P 500 at the end of 2021, the index fell by close to 4% within a day. The market reaction was not contained only to US stocks: over the coming days, UK stocks declined as well, credit spreads in both jurisdictions widened and the US dollar depreciated. Below, we establish that many of these dynamics represent systematic patterns following Mag-7 equity price shocks, which we argue may provide a plausible base case for how an AI crash scenario could transmit to financial markets.

Specification and results

Armed with our shock series, we now study how big-tech equity price surprises affect global asset prices using a parsimonious local projection framework.

yt+hiyt1i=β0h+β1hεtMag7+Xt1i+ut,hi(2)y^i_{t+h} – y^i_{t-1} = \beta_0^h + \beta_1^h\varepsilon_t^{Mag7} + X_{t-1}^{i} + u_{t,h}^i\quad\quad\quad\quad\quad\quad(2)

where  corresponds to an asset price of interest in country , including equity indices, effective exchange rates, credit spreads, nominal government bond yields and break-even inflation rates. Controls in  include lags of the dependent variable as well as other asset price changes. Our coefficients of interest, , measure the marginal effects of a negative 1% Mag-7 equity price shock on   business days after the earnings announcement.

Focusing first on the equity market, Chart 2 traces the reaction () of the S&P 500 and the FTSE 100 to a -1% Mag-7 equity price shock. Importantly, since the underlying Mag-7 stock price changes are weighted by each firm’s size in the S&P 500, a -1% shock mechanically implies a 1% fall in the S&P 500 index on impact. In Panel (a) of Chart 2, we see that the S&P 500 declines by nearly 2% to the shock, implying significant spillovers to other firms in the index as well. These spillovers are of comparable magnitude to the mechanical effect. Relatedly, within two days, the FTSE 100 declines by 1% as well despite no mechanical effect, showcasing that equity indices outside the US, in this case the UK, are significantly affected by news intrinsic to major US tech firms. Both effects are relatively persistent as well.


Chart 2: Equity-market response to a -1% Mag-7 equity price shock

Notes: The chart plots the response of the S&P 500 (left) and FTSE 100 (right) to a -1% Mag-7 equity price shock, as described in Equation (1) and estimated according to Equation (2). 68% (blue) and 90% (light blue) confidence intervals constructed with Newey-West standard errors.

Source: Staff estimates.


Turning to exchange rates, Chart 3 plots the responses of the dollar and the pound nominal effective exchange rates (NEER), which move opposite to one another. We estimate that a -1% Mag-7 equity price shock depreciates the dollar on impact, with a peak effective depreciation of 0.3% a week after the earnings announcement. Sterling, on the other hand, appreciates in effective terms by about 0.5% over a similar timeframe.

Overall, in combination with the earlier equity price responses, this USD depreciation suggests that negative US tech-sector earnings news leads investors to pivot away from US equities, depreciating the dollar by outweighing any other flight-to-safety dynamics into US government bonds. While our identification strategy imposes no restrictions on the underlying mix of structural shocks driving our Mag-7 equity surprises, these results are consistent with investors interpreting negative US big-tech earnings news as downward revisions to future US productivity (Chahrour et al (2024)).


Chart 3: Exchange rate response to a -1% Mag-7 equity price shock

Notes: The chart plots the response of the USD NEER (left) and GBP NEER (right) to a -1% Mag-7 equity price shock, as described in Equation (1) and estimated according to Equation (2). 68% (blue) and 90% (light blue) confidence intervals constructed with Newey-West standard errors.

Source: Staff estimates.


In search of these flight-to-safety dynamics, we study the responses of US and UK 10-year government bond yields. Panels (a) and (b) of Chart 4 show that yields in both jurisdictions fall by a couple of basis points on impact, in line with a muted flight-to-safety or a decline in aggregate demand, before rising, although this rebound is not statistically significant. A rise in yields following a negative Mag-7 earnings news is consistent with new evidence by Andrews and Farboodi (2026) on the release of new AI models, which is understood to be good news about future productivity. Lustig et al (2026) argue that this is the result of US fiscal sustainability increasing in productivity, meaning that US government bond holders are effectively long AI. These offsetting channels may explain the overall muted response on bond markets.

Interestingly, Panel (c) of Chart 4 shows that 10-year breakeven inflation rates meaningfully decline in the US following negative Mag-7 earnings news, potentially indicating important demand-side effects to the shock. As a result, US 10-year real yields rise. The response in the UK, however, is more attenuated on impact, but grows over time.


Chart 4: Government-bond market response to a -1% Mag-7 equity price shock

Notes: The chart plots the response of US 10-year sovereign nominal yields (top left), UK 10-year sovereign yields (top right), US 10-year breakeven inflation (bottom left) and UK 10-year breakeven inflation (bottom right) to a -1% Mag-7 equity price shock, as described in Equation (1) and estimated according to Equation (2). 68% (blue) and 90% (light blue) confidence intervals constructed with Newey-West standard errors.

Source: Staff estimates.


Finally, Chart 5 plots the responses of US and UK credit spread indices to the negative Mag-7 equity price shock. US credit spreads rise on impact, with the effect growing to between 5 and 10 basis points after three weeks. The results are similar for the UK spreads, although the on-impact reaction is more muted. Overall, these findings showcase that big-tech equity price shocks spillover to corporate credit borrowing rates as well.


Chart 5: Corporate credit market response to a -1% Mag-7 equity price shock

Notes: The chart plots the response of US (left) and UK credit spreads to a -1% Mag-7 equity price shock, as described in Equation (1) and estimated according to Equation (2). 68% (blue) and 90% (light blue) confidence intervals constructed with Newey-West standard errors.

Source: Staff estimates.


Conclusion

The current AI equity boom has been characterised by expectations of greater US productivity growth. In this post, we have explored how an AI correction could unfold, leveraging a novel high-frequency equity price shock around the earnings announcements of the magnificent-7 US tech companies.

These shocks provide evidence that what originates in Big Tech does not stay confined to Big Tech. On negative Mag-7 earnings news, equity markets decline, credit spreads widen, the US dollar depreciates, and bond yields are muted, suggesting that a downward revision to US productivity outweighs flight-to-safety dynamics. These findings have two policy implications. First, significant cross-border spillovers to equity and credit markets imply that policymakers should not rely on corrections to elevated US tech-sector valuations remaining confined to the United States. Second, a USD depreciation could exacerbate the macroeconomic effects of these spillovers, increasing the downside risks to an AI crash globally. In particular, foreign economies have historically benefitted from a USD appreciation in times of stress in terms of export competitiveness and a net wealth transfer that helps offset the valuation losses on their USD asset holdings. Accounting for a potential USD depreciation is therefore paramount for policymakers when considering AI crash scenarios.


Daniel Ostry, Roger Vicquéry and Emilio Zaratiegui work in the Bank’s Global Analysis Division.

If you want to get in touch, please email us at bankunderground@bankofengland.co.uk or leave a comment below.

Comments will only appear once approved by a moderator, and are only published where a full name is supplied. Bank Underground is a blog for Bank of England staff to share views that challenge – or support – prevailing policy orthodoxies. The views expressed here are those of the authors, and are not necessarily those of the Bank of England, or its policy committees.

Who is reading Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and Nvidia’s Jensen Huang’s AI manifestos?



Good morning. Phil Wahba writing this morning from New York. Earlier this week, Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg published a few of his thoughts. Specifically 6,500 words outlining ways to spread the wealth and opportunity from AI to all people, including skeptics such as residents of communities that host data centers.

That word count made the piece about one-tenth the length of the average novel—and 10x his article on Personal Superintelligence a year ago.

And Zuckerberg is not alone: Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei delivered the longest piece in this genre so far in 2024 with his 13,000-word “Machines of Loving Grace” essay, while Nvidia’s Jensen Huang has also joined in, as have other AI CEOs. The official explanation is high-minded: with Wall Street scrutinizing Meta’s tens of billions in spending and rival labs racing for dominance, these founders want to lay out their vision in exacting detail and bring regulators and the public along. As Columbia Business School professor Dan Wang told me, “They have to draw the boundaries around why AI can be useful even before they begin selling products.”

But there’s a less flattering read, and communications specialist Patrick Riccards put it best. “CEOs, particularly tech CEOs, believe that their words are gospel,” he told me. These essays, he says, are flags planted in the ground: “You essentially have five or six tech CEOs that are trying to demonstrate whose…[shall we say essay] is bigger.” In our era of short attention spans, that raises an obvious problem. Do people other than AI titans even read these? And if not, what’s the point?

For a model of what leadership via long form can actually look like, it’s useful to examine the master of the genre. Warren Buffett went long in his annual letters to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders—often 10,000-plus words, deep on the year’s lessons and the company’s results, sprinkled with folksy wisdom. But the length was never the point. Buffett wrote to be understood by anyone; he famously drafted his letters as if explaining the business to his own sisters, smart people who happened to be outside finance. People didn’t read him because he wrote a lot. They read him because he’d earned the right to be heard, over decades of results, and then chose to be plain about it. (His successor Greg Abel’s first letter as CEO this year followed that tradition.)

And there’s the distinction. Buffett knew exactly who his readers were. Zuckerberg, Amodei and the rest are writing to each other—a closed loop of founders, investors and the reporters who cover them, each essay answering the last. But is that the right audience? Zuckerberg is facing heat from the public who are wary of data centers in their communities and low on trust for Big Tech. A 6,500-word manifesto seems unlikely to change their minds. If there’s one lesson any CEO can take from Buffett, it’s that the writing is easy—earning the right to be read is the hard part.

Contact CEO Daily via Diane Brady at diane.brady@fortune.com

Top leadership news

Traders pay for Trump posts

Trump Media has signed up nearly a dozen customers, including high-frequency trading firms, for a service that provides early access to President Trump’s Truth Social posts for up to $100,000 per month. NYU Stern economist Gian Luca Clementi told Fortune, “This is insider trading by definition.”

Canva cuts growth forecast

Canva lowered its expected revenue growth rate to 20% after unexpectedly high AI-delivery costs forced it to slow its rollout, despite demand for the new tools exceeding expectations. CEO Melanie Perkins told Fortune the company chose to “slow the rollout while we rebuilt the architecture, reduced unit costs and strengthened the business model” rather than release a product before its economics worked.

Economy is a ‘mess’ despite inflation relief

Consumer prices rose 0.1% in July and 3.4% over the past year, matching expectations, as lower energy prices offset other price pressures. KPMG chief economist Diane Swonk wrote that the “economy is a mess,” warning that higher fuel costs could become more apparent in August’s report.

The markets

S&P 500 futures are up 0.097% this morning. The STOXX Europe 600 was up 0.11% in early trading. The U.K.’s FTSE 100 was down 0.41% in early trading. The Nikkei 225 is up 1.16%. South Korea’s KOSPI was up 3.56%. China’s CSI 300 was down 0.57%. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was down 0.25%. India’s NIFTY 50 was down 0.34%. Bitcoin is slightly up at $63,788.

Around the watercooler

The majority of U.S. employers say they plan to increase hiring this year—these are the top roles they’re looking to fill by Emma Burleigh

Bob Iger and Josh Kushner buy the LA Lakers for a record-breaking $12.5 billion, up 21% in just the 14 months since Mark Walter bought them by Catherina Gioino

Japan and the U.S. just spent billions to try to save the yen. Why is it already losing ground? By Nicholas Gordon

Nvidia found a new way to keep the AI boom funded: your retirement money by Eva Roytburg

CEO Daily is curated and edited by Joseph Abrams, Jason Ma, Claire Zillman, and Lee Clifford.

Desjardins mortgage portfolio grows 8% as quarterly earnings rise




Residential mortgage balances reached $206.8 billion, while improved margins and lower credit-loss provisions helped lift second-quarter earnings.

T’es avancé ou INCONSCIENT ?



.
.
.
.
.
Investir comporte des risques de perte partielle ou totale du capital investi ou prêté. Le contenu sur mon compte ainsi que les produits proposés sont uniquement éducatifs et informatifs.

#investissement #devenirriche #bourse #finance #argent #libertefinanciere

source

Copa (CPA) Q2 2026 Earnings Call Transcript


Image source: The Motley Fool.

DATE

Thursday, Aug. 6, 2026 at 11 a.m. ET

CALL PARTICIPANTS

  • Director of Investor Relations – Daniel Tapia
  • Executive Chairman and Chief Executive Officer – Pedro Heilbron
  • Executive Vice President – Robert Carey
  • Chief Financial Officer – Peter Donkersloot Ponce

TAKEAWAYS

  • Operating Profit — $91.7 million, representing an operating margin of 8.7%, which decreased 13.1 percentage points year over year due to significantly higher fuel expenses.
  • Net Profit — $68.2 million, or $1.67 per share, reflecting a 53.9% year-over-year decrease in earnings per share.
  • Total Operating Revenue — $1.1 billion, increasing 25.7% year over year driven by higher capacity and unit revenues.
  • Passenger Revenue — $1.0 billion, a 25.8% increase compared to the prior year resulting from 15.7% growth in revenue passenger miles and higher yields.
  • Passenger Yield — 12.6 cents, increasing 8.7% year over year as management implemented fare increases to recover rising fuel costs.
  • Revenue Per Available Seat Mile (RASM) — 11.6 cents, an 7.9% increase year over year, though partially offset by a 0.1-cent impact from shifting travel patterns during the World Cup.
  • Capacity (ASMs) — 9.15 billion, increasing 16.5% year over year as the company received more aircraft and improved utilization.
  • Load Factor — 86.7%, compared to 87.3% in the prior-year period, reflecting modest pressure from the World Cup event in June.
  • Cost Per Available Seat Mile (Ex-Fuel CASM) — 5.7 cents, remaining flat year over year and reflecting continued focus on cost discipline.
  • Total CASM — 10.6 cents, a 26.0% increase year over year driven primarily by the higher cost of jet fuel.
  • All-in Jet Fuel Price — $4.28 per gallon, representing an 84.8% increase compared to the second quarter of 2025.
  • Fuel Recovery — 40%, representing the portion of the year-over-year fuel expense increase recovered through higher yields and demand.
  • Cash and Investments — $1.5 billion, representing 39% of the last 12-month revenues and supporting a net debt-to-EBITDA ratio of 0.9x.
  • Total Debt — Approximately $2.7 billion, entirely related to aircraft financing with an average cost of debt of 3.7%.
  • Fleet Count — 131 aircraft, including four Boeing 737 MAX 8 deliveries received during the quarter.
  • Operational Reliability — 90.6% on-time performance and a 99.8% flight completion factor during the second quarter.
  • Updated Full-Year Operating Margin Guidance — 17% to 19%, based on current fuel projections and sustained demand across the network.
  • Updated Full-Year Capacity Guidance — 14% to 15% ASM growth, an increase from previous estimates due to faster aircraft deliveries and higher utilization.
  • Full-Year Fuel Price Assumption — $3.60 per gallon, factoring in elevated and volatile market levels relative to 2025.
  • Quarterly Dividend — $1.71 per share, ratified by the board to be paid on Sept. 15 to shareholders of record as of Aug. 31.
  • Capital Expenditures (CapEx) — $700 million to $750 million for the full year, adjusted down by $50 million due to the shift of one aircraft delivery from December to January.
  • Cargo and Mail Revenue — $34.2 million, a 20.8% increase reflecting the full-year effect of operating a second freighter aircraft.
  • Share Repurchases — $45 million executed year to date, with approximately $60 million remaining under the current authorization.
  • Third-Quarter Bookings — 75% booked as of the call date, with management reporting sustained demand trends across all regions.

Need a quote from a Motley Fool analyst? Email [email protected]

RISKS

  • Heilbron stated, “Our results were affected by an increase of 85 percent in the all in fuel cost, compared to Q2 25,” noting that approximately 40% of quarterly bookings were already sold before the price surge, limiting immediate recovery.
  • Carey noted that the World Cup “temporarily affected travel patterns during June,” resulting in a June load factor that was 2.3 percentage points lower year over year.

SUMMARY

Management reported that Copa Holdings, S.A. (CPA +1.01%) maintained profitability in the second quarter despite significant volatility in jet fuel prices. The company is executing a strategic expansion of its Hub of the Americas, transitioning from six to eight connecting banks to improve aircraft utilization and passenger connectivity. Financial performance was supported by capacity growth and higher yields, though results were partially impacted by seasonal travel shifts related to the World Cup. The company maintains a liquid balance sheet and is proceeding with fleet modernization and the rollout of high-speed onboard connectivity to enhance the passenger experience.

  • Executive Vice President Carey reported that July traffic results showed a load factor of “nearly 90 percent on a year over year capacity increase of 16 percent,” indicating demand remained strong following the World Cup impact.
  • The company will transition its Panama City hub from six to eight connecting banks in March 2027, a decision Heilbron stated will “increase aircraft utilization, optimize the use of airport infrastructure, and further strengthen Panama’s position as the leading hub.”
  • Copa Airlines became the first carrier in Latin America to offer Starlink high-speed internet, with first flights operating in July and full fleet installation expected by the first half of 2027.
  • Management identified Brazil and North America as showing marginally stronger demand trends, though Heilbron noted that “every market is very healthy” across the entire network.
  • The company maintains fleet flexibility for 2028 and beyond, with over 40 unencumbered aircraft and multiple lease expirations that allow for growth adjustments based on market conditions.
  • For the second half of 2026, Carey indicated the company is seeing a “plus 10 percent on RASM” trend that is expected to remain consistent across the third and fourth quarters.

INDUSTRY GLOSSARY

  • Available Seat Miles (ASMs): A measure of an airline’s carrying capacity, calculated by multiplying the number of seats available for passengers by the number of miles those seats are flown.
  • Revenue Per Available Seat Mile (RASM): A metric used to measure an airline’s efficiency, calculated by dividing operating revenue by available seat miles.
  • Cost Per Available Seat Mile (CASM): A common unit of cost in the airline industry, representing the cost to fly one seat one mile.
  • Load Factor: A measure of the percentage of available seating capacity that is filled with passengers.
  • Yield: The average amount of revenue earned per passenger per mile flown.
  • Revenue Passenger Miles (RPMs): A measure of the volume of passenger traffic, calculated by multiplying the number of revenue-paying passengers by the miles they traveled.
  • Connecting Bank: A scheduling system at a hub airport where a group of flights arrive and depart within a coordinated window to maximize passenger transfer options.
  • Hub of the Americas: The company’s primary flight operations center located at Tocumen International Airport in Panama City.
  • NDC (New Distribution Capability): A travel industry-supported program for the development and market adoption of a new, XML-based data transmission standard.

Full Conference Call Transcript

Operator: Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to Copa Holdings Second Quarter Earnings Call. During the presentation, all participants will be in listen only mode. Afterwards, we will conduct a question and answer session. At that time, if you have a question, you will have to press *11 on your touch tone phone. As a reminder, this call is being webcast and recorded on 08/06/2026. Now I will turn the conference call over to Daniel Tapia, Director of Investor Relations. Sir, you may begin.

Daniel Tapia: Thank you, Alia, and welcome everyone to our second quarter earnings call. Joining me today are Mr. Pedro Heilbron, executive chairman and CEO of Copa Holdings, Mr. Robert Carey, executive vice president and Peter Donkersloot Ponce, our CFO. Pedro will begin with an overview of the core of the quarter, Robert will then discuss commercial performance and operational highlights. Peter will conclude with a review of our financial results and outlook. Immediately after, we will open the call for questions from analysts. As a reminder, Copa, Holdings financial reports have been prepared in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards. In today’s call, we will discuss certain non IFRS financial measures.

A reconciliation of these measures to comparable IFRS measures can be found in our earnings release. Is available on our website. Our discussion today will also contain forward looking statements. Not limited to historical facts that reflect the company’s current beliefs, expectations, and or intentions regarding future events and results. These forward looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially are based on assumptions subject to change. Many of these are discussed in our annual report filed with the SEC. Now I will turn I would like to turn the call over to our Chairman and CEO, Mr. Pedro Heilbron.

Pedro Heilbron: Thank you, Daniel. Good morning, and thank you all for joining us for our second quarter earnings call. Before we begin, I would like to recognize and thank our more than 9 thousand coworkers. Thanks for their commitment, professionalism, and disciplined execution, our team continued to deliver strong financial results while maintaining exceptional operational reliability and outstanding service to our passengers. They are the foundation of Copa’s success and have my admiration and appreciation. Our second quarter results demonstrate the resilience of our business model in a significantly higher fuel price environment. And reinforce our ability to continue generating profitable growth through different market cycles.

During the quarter, we delivered an operating profit of $91.7 million and an operating margin of 8.7 percent. These results were affected by an increase of 85 percent in the all in fuel cost, compared to Q2 25. With approximately 40 percent of our bookings sold before the TRIO cost increase. In the quarter, we grew capacity 16.5 percent measured in ASMs, while maintaining solid load factors. Our capacity additions in 2026 after years which aircraft delivery delays slowed our growth, allow us to further consolidate our Hub of The Americas advantage especially in an environment of strong passenger demand across our network. Looking ahead, booking trends remain strong.

Which support our expectations for another year of high load factors and solid financial performance. As part of our continuous efforts to strengthen the Hub of the Americas, we recently set in place our transition from 6 to 8 connecting banks beginning in March 2027. This decision will improve connectivity throughout our network provide greater travel options for our passengers, increase aircraft utilization, optimize the use of airport infrastructure, and further strengthen Panama’s position as the leading hub for intra America’s travel.

Combined with our structurally low unit cost, best in class operational reliability, strong balance sheet, and the unique advantages of our Hub of the Americas, we remain confident in our ability to successfully execute our growth plans and continue delivering value to our shareholders. With that, I will turn the call over to Robert who will discuss the quarter’s commercial and operational highlights.

Robert Carey: Thank you, Pedro, and good morning, everyone. Before I start, I would also like to thank our coworkers across the organization for their continued dedication and outstanding execution throughout the quarter. I have now been here 2 years and Copa’s culture is clearly 1 of our strengths. Let me begin by reviewing some of the quarter’s key commercial and operational highlights. Operating revenues increased 25.7 percent year over year to $1.1 billion Passenger yields increased 8.7 percent compared to Q2 25. Unit revenue or RASM increased 7.9 percent to 11.6 cents while capacity measured in ASMs increased 16.5 percent year over year. Load factor was 86.7 percent. Compared to 87.3 percent in Q2 25.

Revenue performance for the quarter was partially impacted by the World Cup. Which temporarily affected travel patterns during June. As a result, June load factors were 2.3 percentage points lower year over year. Putting modest pressure on unit revenues. We estimate that the World Cup reduced second quarter RASM by approximately 0.1 cents. Despite this headwind, we delivered another quarter of solid revenue performance and continue to see strong demand trends throughout our network going forward. Demonstrating this strong demand we published our July traffic numbers this week, reporting a load factor of nearly 90 percent on a year over year capacity increase of 16 percent.

Furthermore, this load factor 1 of our highest ever came in a higher yield environment. As you can see from our full year guidance, we are expecting these strong load factors to continue. On the operational side, we delivered industry leading results. During the quarter, Copa Airlines delivered an on time performance of 90.6 percent. And a flight completion factor of 99.8 percent. These results position Copa Airlines among the very best airlines globally, for operational reliability and represent a key differentiator of our passenger value proposition. Turning to the network. Recently, we announced the addition of Porlamar, in Isla Margarita, Venezuela. A popular leisure destination which will start in November.

With this addition, Copa will serve 88 destinations in 32 countries throughout The Americas. Further strengthening the breadth and convenience of our network and reinforcing the leadership position of our Hub of the Americas. We also recently achieved an important milestone in enhancing our passenger experience with the launch of Starlink onboard Internet. In July, Copa operated its first Starlink equipped flight. Becoming the first airline in Latin America. To offer high speed Starlink connectivity. We expect the rollout of StarLink Wi Fi across our fleet to be completed in the first half of 27. Finally, on the fleet side, we took delivery of 4 Boeing 37 MAX 8 aircraft during the quarter.

Ending the period with a fleet of 131 aircraft. For the remainder of the year, we expect to receive 1 additional 37. As always, we maintain significant flexibility in our fleet plan. Through delivery options, flight rights, lease expirations, and a substantial base of unencumbered aircraft. Which allows us to adjust the pace of growth if market conditions warrant. To conclude, demand trends and booking patterns remain strong. With that, I will turn the call over to Peter, who will review our results and outlook in more detail.

Peter Donkersloot Ponce: Thank you, Robert, and good morning. I will also like to start by recognizing our team’s continued dedication delivering industry leading results. Their commitment remains essential to our strong operational and financial performance. In the second quarter, we reported an operating profit of $91.7 million resulting in an operating margin of 8.7 percent. Compared to 21.7 percent in the second quarter of 25. Net profit totaled $68.2 million or $1.67 per share. And a net margin of 6.4 percent. Unit cost, excluding fuel or ex-fuel CASM, remained flat. Year over year. To 5.7 cents. Reflecting our continuous focus on cost discipline. Including fuel CASM increased 26 percent to 10.6 cents. A result of significantly higher fuel prices.

During the quarter, average all in jet fuel price increased 85 percent year over year. From $2.32 to $4.28 per gallon. Despite having approximately 40 percent of our second quarter bookings already sold before the increase in fuel prices, strong demand higher yields enable us to recover approximately 40 percent of the year over year increase in fuel expenses during the quarter. Our fuel recovery calculation compares the year over year increase in revenues attributable to higher RASM with a year over year increase in fuel expenses resulting from higher all in fuel prices. Both calculated using 2026 capacity levels. Turning to our balance sheet and liquidity.

We ended the quarter with approximately $1.5 billion in cash short term and long term investments. Representing 39 percent of last 12 months revenue. Our balance sheet remains among the strongest in the airline industry and continues to be a key competitive advantage. Total debt, including lease liabilities, stood at approximately 2.7 billion at quarter end. All of it related to aircraft financing. Our average cost of debt is currently 3.7 percent and we ended the quarter with a net debt-to-EBITDA ratio of 0.9x. Our financial strength continues to provide substantial flexibility as we continue to execute our long term strategy. Turning now to shareholder returns.

I am pleased to announce our Board of Directors ratified the company’s third quarterly dividend payment of $1.71 per share The dividend will be paid on September 15 to all shareholders of record as of August 31. Looking ahead, while fuel prices remain elevated and volatile relative to prior year levels, Underlying demand trends across our network continue to be strong. Based on these demand strengths, and current fuel cost projections, we are updating our full year outlook and now expect an operating margin for 2026 to be in the range of 17 to 19 percent. With a capacity growth of between 14 to 15 percent.

This outlook assumes approximately a load factor of 87 percent a RASM of 12 cents, ex-fuel CASM of 5.7 cents, and an all in fuel price per gallon of $3.60. To summarize, demand and revenue trends remain strong across our network. We are maintaining industry leading cost discipline Our balance sheet remains among the strongest in the industry. And our proven business model continues to position us well to navigate the current fuel environment while delivering profitable growth and long term shareholder value. Thank you, and we will now open the call for questions from the analysts.

Operator: Thank you. At this time, we will conduct a question and answer session. As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press *11 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press *11 again. Please stand by while we compile the Q and A roster. Our first question comes from the line of Savanthi Syth from Raymond James. Your line is now open.

Savanthi Syth: Hey. Good morning.

Pedro Heilbron: Good morning.

Savanthi Syth: I was kind of curious. I think, Pedro, I think you mentioned or that the third the second quarter was 40 percent booked. Heading into prior to all the kind of fare increases. I was curious how much of the third quarter was booked prior to the fare increases? And as you kind of look out, how much of the third and the fourth quarter are in the books today?

Pedro Heilbron: Okay. So in Q3, was pre war, of course. We had about 20%, a little bit below 20% booked for Q3. And, of course, much less for Q4. Almost nothing for Q4. And today? Adria, how much is the [Inaudible]

Robert Carey: And then, Savi, your question was what is the outlook right now for Q3 or what is the booking level for Q3 and Q4?

Savanthi Syth: Correct? that is correct.

Robert Carey: Yeah. Yeah. Right now, we are about 75% booked for Q3. And about 25% sold for Q4.

Savanthi Syth: Perfect. And if I might, just curious. I saw that it is kind of slight changes in the delivery schedule here, for 26, 27. Any early thoughts on how you are thinking about deliveries in 2028 as I am guessing some of those discussions are happening now?

Pedro Heilbron: Yeah. We publish up to 2027. If I am not mistaken, and we are getting 12 aircraft in 2027. And as always, we have some flexibility. We are going to let go 7 hundred. That come up for their 20 year checks. So we will not do those 20 year checks. We will let 7 hundreds go. So net will be 10 aircraft. Joining Copa Holdings in 2027. We still have another 7 hundreds, which we can let go. We can park at any time. We can harvest the engine. So we also have that flexibility. But we are expecting a strong 2027. Of course, we are not guiding to 2027 yet. But we are very comfortable with the aircraft.

We are we are having delivered next year, and we think we need them all. For 2028, the number again, we have not shared yet. It will be higher because it is like almost the end of the road for all the Boeing delays delivery delays that we had in the last 4 years. And However, we also have a number of lease expirations. We have 6 lease expirations plus the 7 hundred. So we have, like, 11 aircraft that we could let go easily. In 2028 depending on demand. And plus we have our unencumbered aircraft, which is over 40. So we have lots of flexibility.

Again, we think we are going to need most of our 2028 deliveries We will share that information towards the end of the year. But we have lots of flexibility. I appreciate that preliminary color. Thanks, Fred.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Duane Pfennigwerth of Evercore ISI. Your line is now open.

Duane Pfennigwerth: Hey. Thank you. As you think about the full year unit revenue guidance up 7 percent-ish on 15 percent capacity growth, so low 20s revenue growth. Just wondering if you can give some color on the balance of the back half, which do you expect a big variation between third quarter unit revenue growth and the fourth quarter? Or is your expectation that they would look pretty similar at this point?

Pedro Heilbron: I will let Robert answer that question. But I will say that I think the number 1 thing that is very important is that we are seeing strong demand right now. And so that makes us very comfortable with our projections, of course, that as of today. And but I will let Robert share some of the specifics.

Robert Carey: Yeah. Morning, Dwayne. At this point, we are seeing, plus 10 percent on RASM in h 2. I would say it is fairly consistent across Q3, Q4. In terms of year over year variation, it is broadly somewhere between the 2. So I think nothing really of note in either quarter. That varies.

Duane Pfennigwerth: Great. Thank you. that is very clear. And then just on the trajectory of a non op net interest expense, anything to call out in that trajectory into the back half of the year? And thanks for taking the questions.

Peter Donkersloot Ponce: Hello, Duane. How are you? This is Peter. I would say that it is pretty stable that net interest expense that we are going to see across the across the year, nothing to highlight and as we receive more aircraft we have little bit more financing cost, but it is a embedded in our seed plan and pretty much straightforward. To calculate it. Okay. Thank you.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Guilherme Mendes of JPMorgan. Your line is now open.

Guilherme Mendes: Yes. Thank you. Good morning, all Pedro, Peter. Robert, and Daniel. Thanks for taking my question. I have 2. The first is on the capacity guidance. So the upward revision, that we saw this quarter, if you can share some details on what is behind it, it is just a matter of receiving more aircraft earlier than expected or anything else in terms of utilization maybe. And the second point is on the Starlink announcement. If you do not mind sharing some additional details on what is the expected CapEx or costs associated with implementing the StarLink and if you intend to charge for it, if it will be somehow a loyalty lever. Thank you.

Pedro Heilbron: Yes. Thank you, Guilherme. In terms of the increased ASM guidance, as I heard correctly. I would say a few things. 1, that we were conservative or careful with our original guidance not being 100 percent sure on the Boeing delivery dates. As the year has gone through, not only is Boeing delivering on time, but actually at least 1 aircraft, we got ahead– 1 aircraft we got ahead by a month. Another a few other aircraft came in a few weeks before. And so we have been able to deploy those aircraft much faster during the year. Plus, we have increased utilization. So we are also getting additional aircraft hours and ASM through utilization.

So the combination of those factors allow us to increase our capacity guidance. And of course, the demand is there. We have strong demand. So we are really happy to be able to guide to higher ASM capacity. In terms of StarLink, I will let Robert complement the answer. But the CapEx was done many months ago. Already in the books and in the guidance. it is there. And, I do not know if you wanna share something else, Robert.

Robert Carey: Yeah. On the business model, first, I mean, we are excited to be the first airline in Latin America to be offering this. The business model complementary access is gonna be there for business class passengers, all of our preferred member gold platinum, and presidential members, as well as Starlink subscribers. And then other passengers are gonna pay for the service. that is the business model we set up.

Pedro Heilbron: Yeah. And on the CapEx, I will just add that it was prepaid as Pedro said. And would just start depreciating from depreciation once the service is installed. For the cash purposes, it is already sitting on our PP&E.

Guilherme Mendes: Amazing. Super clear. Thank you all.

Operator: Thank you. Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Filipe Ferreira Nielsen of Citi. Your line is now open.

Filipe Ferreira Nielsen: Hey. Hello, everyone. Thanks for taking my question. So I have 1 follow-up regarding the delivery schedule, and this is related to CapEx. Just wondering how this, changes your view on CapEx for the year. How are you expecting CapEx to behave considering that you are receiving aircraft earlier? And, my second question is related to the fuel and competitive behavior. Like just wanted to hear a little bit about how this competition behaving to the fuel drops you are guiding to lower fuel in the back half of the year. And everybody else is also guiding for that. Just wondering how pricing and competition is behaving in this environment. Thank you.

Peter Donkersloot Ponce: Hello, Filipe. How are you? This is Peter. I will address your first question regarding CapEx. And, yeah, we are seeing CapEx right now between $700 and $750. So basically, $50 million less than what we guided at the beginning of the year, and this is basically most of it is because there was we are expecting now 1 less delivery that moved a couple weeks from December to January. Basically, that is what is guiding that difference. And then I will let Robert talk about and Pedro talk about the competition.

Pedro Heilbron: Part. Yeah. So I do not wanna, of course, talk much about pricing and competition. it is a delicate subject. But so far, what we see is a lot of discipline. Triggered by the fuel prices, of course. As fuel prices, come down, we will see what happens. We are comfortable with our guidance. And I must say, I think it is important to mention that pre-war, pre the high fuel prices, average fares, at least in our region and network, were actually below Average yields were below 2019. And that is without taking into consideration inflation. So we are comfortable that the yields can be sustained as oil comes down.

If not at a 100 percent, but enough for a positive effect going forward. I do not know if you guys yeah. No. I think you covered it.

Filipe Ferreira Nielsen: Great. This is very clear. Thank you.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Rogério Araújo of Bank of America. Your line is now open.

Rogério Araújo: Hi. Thank you very much. I have a question on the second-quarter guidance. You said the margin guidance at 8 percent to 12%. My question is, what were the main uncertainties embedded in that range? And how did those factors ultimately play out such that results landed within the guidance but toward the lower end? If you could explore what was the drivers behind the guidance and what has happened during the quarter. Thank you so much.

Pedro Heilbron: You are talking about the RASM guidance. Right? Actually, the EBIT margin guidance for the second quarter. Okay. EBIT. Yeah. So we ended up we had guided for an 8% to 12% range, given the uncertainty related to the war, to fuel prices, and even to how demand was gonna respond to higher prices. So we gave a wider range than what we usually give. We ended up within that range. On the lower side of it. Mostly due to RASM that is our unit costs were within– actually, we were at target.

Robert Carey: A 100 percent in target. So was mostly coming from RASM. Fuel was also pretty much in the range we said which was between 80, 90 percent year over year. So the difference was RASM.

Pedro Heilbron: I will let Robert add to it, but I will say that it was kind of very early,, maybe mid quarter when we spoke. And that is where it ended up. I mean, I do not think the there is a lot of magic to it. it is just what happened. Robert, I do not know if you wanna add to that.

Robert Carey: Yeah. I think you covered most of it, Pedro. I mean, Morning, Rogério. The only thing I would say, you know, as we highlighted, the World Cup did impact us a bit more than expected in June. And that is the most notable factor we call out in what drove them being a bit on the lower side than we expected. And there is everything else is kind of small factors, and I think the only other thing is you know, as Pedro highlighted, we had a wide range. It was still pretty early on, and we were trying to understand everything going on with the new fuel environment. And so nothing else of note to call out.

Pedro Heilbron: Yeah. And, Rogério, I would I would also mention that, of course, we are we are guiding to very high margins for the year. Which means that we are guiding for very strong margins in the second half of the year. And especially as fuel eases. I mean fuel still quite high because of crack. Even more so than WTI and Brent. The crack spread is very high. And we are still guiding to very strong margins for the second half of the year. And for the whole year.

Rogério Araújo: that is very clear. Thank you so much.

Pedro Heilbron: Hi, operator. We are ready for our next question. I think we lost the operator. Yeah. I think the next call was coming the next question was coming for Jens? Jens, can you hear us? Oh, can you hear me now? Yeah. We can hear you now.

Michael Linenberg: Yeah. Sorry. My microphone was on mute.

Operator: Our next question comes from Michael Linenberg of Deutsche Bank. Your line is now open.

Michael Linenberg: Oh, hey. Good morning, everyone. I guess 2 here. Just the step up in the growth rate for the year, the capacity growth rate? I know Pedro, you talked– you and Robert have both pointed to the stronger, better than healthy demand. As we think about what is driving that or the sort of the elements of the increased ASMs, how much of that is just an annualization of your growth from call it over the last 6 to 12 months. As well as, maybe increased utilization or stage length And should we anticipate any additional new markets to be announced beyond Porlamar?

Pedro Heilbron: Okay. So let’s get that let’s get that information. So about 50%, half of the growth is full year effect from what was implemented last year. And then maybe a small percent, 10% would be new destinations. And the others the rest is new frequencies, traditional additional frequencies. And, yes, we expect we expect to announce at least 1 more destination for year-end. That should come probably before the end of the month, before the end of August. I think we will be announcing what would be our 89th destination. To be implemented in December. Okay. Great.

Michael Linenberg: And then just my second question, just regarding the hub for next year going from 6 to 8 connecting banks. Pedro, I can recall a time when I think it was either 1 to 2 or 2 to 3. So you have made some huge advances here with respect to the Panama City hub. The question is, where are you on where are you from a infrastructure perspective? You know, going from 6 to 8, will you have tapped out all of all of the gates? Will you have to hard stand airplanes? How should we think about just the facility and its ability to accommodate those 8 connecting banks.

You know, how much more runway does that give you before you would have to maybe sink shovels into the ground and build out the concourses. Thanks. Thanks for taking my questions.

Pedro Heilbron: Yeah. Thank you, Mike. I will let Robert answer.

Robert Carey: Hey, Mike. Good morning. So I think look– hey, good morning. I did take it from 6 to 8 banks. Quite the growth story. Look. I think in terms of facilities, this you know, obviously, this helps us in freeing up capacity. We are not at the limit yet in the sixth bank. Structure, but we were starting to near the limits of it. This obviously creates more capacity for growth over the coming years and eases need for additional infrastructure. Plus, we have the internal benefits. You know, we get better utilization. On the aircraft as well as a lot of more options for our customers, which is what is most exciting.

You know, I think in terms of the airport infrastructure then when it changes, you know, there is still a number of investment plans here at the airport over the coming you know, 5 to call it, 5-year horizon. Which will help with gates, which will help with runway capacity, etcetera, as well as just some other projects that are ongoing here. So the combination of those 2, you know, pretty similar to, I think, what we talked about back in the investor day, give us pretty good runway going forward into the next, you know, call it, 5, 10 years. To keep growing comfortably.

Michael Linenberg: Robert, to go from 6 to 8 percent, does that at all change your connection rates and or does it make it less likely that you would want to take on the max 10, which I know is gonna be certified soon? And I know that you have the ability to you know, exchange you know, orders for max eights and nines into the tens. Does that at all change that calculus?

Robert Carey: No. I mean, I think connectivity gives more options. And roughly, the connectivity for the passenger in terms of time of connection. I think, you know, there is some that go down a little, some that go up a little. So the on hold, the average stays broadly the same. In aircraft, it is– aircraft decisions, no. I think, you know, no change. And we are evaluating the different fleet types that exist in for our new order.

Pedro Heilbron: Yeah. What Mike, what the 8-bank will do and Robert mentioned most of it. I know he mentioned that utilization is gonna improve. And then they are gonna be better scheduled for passengers. Also, the airport assets are gonna be better utilized. So it is also great for the airport, which is great for all. So we see it as a as a very, very positive development.

Robert Carey: Absolutely.

Michael Linenberg: Great. But the RASM improver and a and a CASM detractor is kind of how I should think about it. Well, that is that is music for our ears. Exactly. it is like thank you.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from Jens Spiess of Morgan Stanley. Your line is now open. We will move to our next question from Alberto Valerio of EBS. Oh, sorry. You here, Jens?

Jens Spiess: Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. Okay. Sorry. I was on mute. Yeah. Hi, everybody. So I only have 2 basically small modeling questions. 1 is on the buyback program, the 200 million I think you mentioned before that you had executed half of it, I think back on the envelope, we are getting to you executing around 35 million this quarter. So how much more or less do you have left? Is it around 65 million Is it correct? And secondly, on the 02/2027 deliveries, I think you were expecting to get 12 deliveries. You mentioned that 1 will be shifting from this year to next year. So are you still– are you now expecting to receive 13 aircraft?

And more or less throughout the year, how will you be receiving them? Is it more front or back loaded? Thank you.

Peter Donkersloot Ponce: Hello, Jens. How are you? This is Peter. On the buyback program, just to clarify, we have executed $45 million year to date. And we have around $60 million left. For the program to be executed. And, of course, as we always said, whenever we finish, we will we will request the authorization to have an additional program. We always like to have the program open. And then on the delivery schedule, I will tell you to have small movements.

Pedro Heilbron: As we get closer to delivery, deliveries are updated, we have movement And most of the movements we clarify are about a week. They are where delivery is expected in December, and then they move to January. It does not change the ASMs counts for at least this year does not change at all because we did not have that plane flying this year, so it does not change. And then the next year, we also have some deliveries moving from 2027 to 28, but it is also those December deliveries that are moving to January 2028. So, again, nothing material. it is just the regular update that as we get closer to the delivery dates.

I do not know if you wanna add something.

Robert Carey: The only thing the other part, Jens, is yeah. Look 12 next year are pretty evenly spaced throughout the year.

Jens Spiess: Perfect. Alright. Alright. Thank you.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from Alberto Valerio of UBS. Your line is now open.

Alberto Valerio: Thank you. Good morning, gentlemen. Thanks for taking my questions. I have 1 on your side. Oil price come up. Your cost come up, like, 85 percent per gallon. You could pass through a part of it, and you look like you keep this pass-through to the remain of the year. If you could detail or give some explanation where this demand is coming from. If it is strong around your network, South America, North America, Central, or if there is any specific point? Then the other point is about what a word was used before. It looked like airlines were leaving some profitability on the table. If you can tell us how resilient this is? Thank you very much.

Pedro Heilbron: Thank you. I will start, and then I will let Robert complement my answer and maybe add some color. But we see strength throughout our network. There is not really 1 region that is that is doing much better or that is weak compared to the rest. Of course, we always we are always going to have certain markets are going to be on the on the top end. And then some that are going to be in between and maybe lower. But actually, every market is very healthy, and we are getting demand from our whole network. So that is, I would say, a very positive development which is not always the case.

And the diversity of our network is always an asset. And I guess it is a greater asset now that everything is doing well. I am now I will end it.

Robert Carey: I am not going to add to that. Yeah. Robert, but I think the only thing you know, as Pedro said, across the board, it is pretty consistent that all the markets are reacting you know, are showing positive demand signs and pretty evenly kind of the yield increases coming through. And so I think that is a very positive sign to where things stand. No. You know, I think this there is some, you know, Brazil, North America are slightly stronger, but it is kind of, you know, on the margin. Everything is doing very well.

Pedro Heilbron: And, To answer your other question? We are we are we are pretty much positive on how sustainable the price increases are going to be. Because, as I mentioned before that before the oil crisis, our yields, our average yields in the region, were below 2019, and that is not even taking into account inflation. So as fuel comes down, even if there are some adjustments and some pricing comes down, we believe there will remain a positive impact And you know, I should also say that we had a record quarter in the in the first quarter of this year.

So going back to that, it is perfectly fine, but if there is and that was with the kind of lower than 2019 yields. We still had a record quarter. So if something is left which we are pretty sure there will be something left on the price increases, if fuel comes down. it is just gonna be net positive over an already strong base. So we are very positive about this.

Alberto Valerio: it is very clear. Look forward to it. Thank you very much.

Operator: Thank you. This concludes the question and answer session. I would now like to turn it back to Pedro Heilbron, chairman and CEO, for closing remarks.

Pedro Heilbron: Okay. Thank you. Thank you, operator. And thank you all for participating in our earnings call and our Q2 earnings call. Also, thank you for your continued support As you know, you have a committed Copa team on this side. Always working hard to make the results better. And with a very, very positive attitude about how this year. We think it is going to turn out. So, again, thank you, and have a great day.

Operator: Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.

Yesterday’s Rules Don’t Always Apply


Institutional investors routinely rely on cross-asset relationships to build portfolios, assess risk, and explain positioning. Many of those relationships become embedded in investment processes as simple heuristics:

  • The 2-year Treasury yield tracks the federal funds rate.
  • Rising front-end yields strengthen the dollar.
  • Inflation lifts gold.

These rules of thumb work often enough to feel structural. They are not.

Rolling correlations across two decades of data show that each relationship strengthens, weakens, and sometimes reverses as macroeconomic conditions change. These breakdowns are not statistical noise around a stable long-run truth. They signal that the market is pricing a different source of uncertainty.

Cross-asset relationships are not fixed parameters. They are regime-dependent expressions of changing macroeconomic drivers. When the underlying regime shifts, heuristics often survive long after the mechanism that made them useful has disappeared.

For institutional investors, the challenge is not deciding whether a heuristic is right or wrong. It is recognizing when the conditions that made it reliable no longer exist. The three examples that follow illustrate why understanding those regime shifts is more valuable than relying on the heuristic itself.