As regular readers may have observed I am one to mull things over a while before offering up a slice of investment opinion pie. A few weeks ago Barron's (subscription required) ran a cover story titled "Open Skies" discussing the imminent deregulation of trans-Atlantic air routes.

In this context they reviewed the potential for airline mergers, (something I have written about before in Why no airline mergers? Finally the answer...) and they commented on who the winners and losers might be. The article highlights the fact that there has been a 30 year agreement in place, "the Bermuda airline agreement" that limited Heathrow-U.S. air traffic to just four airlines: two British and two U.S. Other foreign airlines were barred flying to the U.S. except from their own nation's airports.

Under terms of a new agreement cast last April U.S and European Union airlines departing 27 nations will be able to fly direct routes. Barron's does a fairly thorough analysis in my view of the potential success among various airlines and those that may come up short.

JetBlue Airways (NASDAQ: JBLU) is having to deal with weather problems, leading to flight problems and canceled flight problems, leading to unhappy passengers causing a 'storm' of bad publicity. In an effort to be the good guys, it came up with it's own "Passenger Bill of Rights." At the same time it reported that these events would affect its financials for the next couple of quarters -- well da!

So what's going on here is something that has been going on in the airline business forever. If you are in the airline business, life hits you harder than other businesses. Weather is uncertain, passenger impatience is very certain, and having to pacify large numbers of people with timely and satisfactory responses is very difficult. The business is seasonal, capital intensive, technology dependent, security constrained, and a constant coordination nightmare. Oh yes, and then there's luggage which does not complain much but has to run through the same system at the same time, in higher numbers than the passengers -- Wow!

If you read my story Why no airline mergers? Finally the answer... you learned the answer was IT'S A LOUSY BUSINESS!!! In this story another subject I mentioned is that the airlines know all this and mergers happen only in dire straits. According to a news bite I read in Barron's on February 5, U.S Airways (NYSE: LLC) withdrew a hostile takeover offer for Delta Airlines (NYSE: DAL) when creditors rejected it. Of course U.S. Airways had no interest in paying retail for an airline company and if you are considering investing maybe you should not either.

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Sheldon Liber is the CEO of a small private investment company and the vice president for design and research at an architecture & planning firm that does aviation and aerospace related projects.