Hawaiian-Alaska merger may yet face an objection from USDOJ

Pago Pago, AMERICAN SAMOA — A small sentence added to a press release set off speculation that the U.S. Department of Justice might yet file an objection to the merger of Hawaiian Airlines and Alaska Airlines.

Shares of HAL parent company Hawaiian Holdings briefly fell Thursday after the business website Securing Alpha pointed out that Alaska Airlines has slightly rewritten its announcement that a deadline expiration meant it was free to close the deal.

What expired was a period, extended three times, in which Alaska Airlines agreed not to consummate the deal because the DOJ Antitrust Division was reviewing the proposal.

The sentence added to the release said the DOJ review is “ongoing.”

DOJ never said it was ending its review — it said nothing whatever, before or after the deadline at 12:01 a.m. EDT, which was 9:01 p.m. Monday at Alaska headquarters in Seattle and 6:01 p.m. in Honolulu. But the airlines, Hawaii state officials, and airline industry reporters assumed DOJ was done since it didn’t seek another deadline extension.

This was evident in last Tuesday filings to the Securities & Exchange Commission by both carriers. The deadline only covered action by the airlines and never constrained DOJ in any way.

Hawaiian shares fell 2% for a while Thursday but then recovered.

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