Hello earthlings! Happy Wednesday! This week’s edition of PlaneBusiness Banter is now posted. Subscribers can access it here.

This week we’re talking about American Airlines’ inclusion in the S&P 500. The news sent shares of AAL up more than 13% last week. Will United Airlines join the S&P party in 2015? We  talk about that and the more important issue for the major U.S. carriers — investment grade debt ratings.

With profits up, and interest rates low, debt reduction takes top priority in our book.

Speaking of American, the airline’s first big IT  “stress test” of the merger begins this weekend, as the airline begins to merge the frequent flyer programs of American and US Airways.  Have miles with both airlines? Take a screen shot of your account pages just to be safe. All of this should be completed by next week, depending on status levels, whether you have accounts with both airlines, etc.

In the meantime, chill. Oh, and don’t try to redeem miles on US Airways right now. That window is now about to close as the airline begins the migration.

We also talk a bit this week about those young up and comers in the industry I like to refer to as ‘The Best and the Brightest.’ In my opinion, we are finally beginning to see more of these folks stay in the industry than had been the case in years past.  We talk about the reasons and why this is a positive change.

Another week, another pilot strike at Lufthansa. Enough already.

Meanwhile, down in Dallas, Southwest Airlines, Delta Air Lines, and the city of Dallas continue to fight over Love Field access. As it stands now, Delta has no gate access at Love as of July 6. Will this change? Will the City of Dallas force the issue? Will we finally find out who shot JR?

Congratulations to all the United Airlines’ employees who participated in the recent NYC Half Marathon in the Big Apple! We personally donated 10 subscriptions to PlaneBusiness Banter as part of the effort that benefited the March of Dimes.  We welcome those new subscribers to the fold this week.

All of this, plus much more, in this week’s edition of PlaneBusiness Banter.