Southwest will limit hiring and cut 4 airports after loss. American Airlines also posts a loss in the first quarter

DALLAS– Southwest Airlines will limit hiring and stop flights to four airports as it faces weak financial results and delays in supplying new planes from Boeing.

Southwest and American Airlines reported first-quarter losses on Thursday. Travel demand remains strong, including among business travelers, but airlines face higher labor costs and delays in aircraft deliveries limit their ability to add additional flights .

Southwest said it lost $231 million. CEO Robert Jordan said the airline was moving quickly “to address our financial underperformance,” including slowing hiring and asking employees to take leave.

The Dallas-based carrier said it expects to finish this year with 2,000 fewer employees than at the start of the year.

Southwest will also stop serving four airports: Cozumel, Mexico; Syracuse, New York; Bellingham, Washington; and Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport, where the airline’s main operations take place at the smaller Hobby Airport.

The closures will help the airline focus on more profitable destinations and deploy a fleet of planes that will be smaller than expected. Southwest said it expects to receive just 20 new 737 Max 8 planes from Boeing this year, down from 46 expected just weeks ago. This will offset some of the shortage by retiring fewer planes.

Boeing has been grappling with a production slowdown since a door jam exploded on an Alaska Airlines Max 9 in January, frustrating its airline customers.

Dallas-based Southwest said its loss, after excluding one-time items, was 36 cents per share. That was slightly worse than the 34 cents per share loss Wall Street expected.

Revenue came in at $6.33 billion, below analysts’ forecasts of $6.42 billion.

American said it lost $312 million as labor costs rose 18%, or nearly $600 million. The airline said it expects to return to profitability in the second quarter – a busier travel period – and post earnings of between $1.15 and $1.45 per share. Analysts expect $1.15 per share, according to a FactSet survey.

The first-quarter loss was 34 cents per share excluding one-time items, which was worse than the 27 cents per share loss expected by analysts.

Revenue was $12.57 billion.

CEO Robert Isom said American was less affected by Boeing’s problems because the airline had already received hundreds of new planes in recent years. American has ordered Boeing Max 10s, a larger model that has not yet been certified by the Federal Aviation Administration, but those planes are not expected to start appearing until 2028.

“If they don’t make it, we made sure we were protected as well,” Isom told CNBC. He did not go so far as to say that the Americans would transfer their orders from Boeing to those of Airbus, simply saying: “We will take care of it.”

In premarket trading, Southwest shares were down 9% while U.S. stocks were up 3%.