According to Expedia, Air China is typically 30% cheaper than its competitors. Am I missing something?

Don't think they'll invest some of that cash into rebranding and creating new logos do you??? That goes for ALL domestic Chinese airlines except maybe for Hainan Airlines...

Note that a Credit Suisse analyst, mentioned in the Financial Times article, claims that Chinese airlines' "fundamentals" are still quite weak. What exactly does that mean? I would love to see this alleged 2,000% increase confirmed under GAAP.

I guess some of that profit will be ploughed back into cancelling that fuel surcharge.

No seriously, they haven't been too bad overall. In the sense that you can't really tell airlines apart, except by the frequency at which you personally encounter extreme screw-ups, which is basically luck of the draw. And thanks to frequent flyer schemes I guess I'm stuck with them for the moment. Par for the course for, I guess, Europe in the mid-1980s. Could be worse. They could be a Russian domestic airline such as Pulkovo Airlines.

Well, William, that's exactly the point I was going to make. At least Air China staff don't hit the passengers - unlike Aeroflot. A famous Pulkovo beating took place just after my one and (please God) only flight with Russia's national airline. Chinese passengers were pushed, shoved and barked at to go back to the toilet they'd just come from. A Russian passenger had a drink poured over him. Then the same Russian passenger had a meal tipped over him. And one of the stewardesses hit me. More things happened, but that will do. Three weeks later, I missed my flight back to Beijing and had spend an enormous amount of money to get back here in time for work. Despite the cost, I was actually glad. Very glad. China Airlines just aren't in that league. They're not luxury, but they're usually not hell.

Correction: I really must apologize to Pulkovo Airlines. The beating that took place a few days after my not-so-comfortable flight was not carried out by Pulkovo staff. Here's the story: link

Cat, that case would play great to a jury in NY. Did you save the air ticket?

"Perhaps another significant reason is that Air China does not spend any money on edible food, enjoyable inflight entertainment, or computer systems that make their planes depart on time. "

No reason for them to "waste" this money since their planes are nearly always packed full, right? ;-)