United Continental CFO Leaves Instead of CEO

By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Jan 11, 11:27PM EST · Published May 17, 5:40PM EDT

Follow 24/7 Wall St. on Google

This post may contain links from our sponsors and affiliates, and Flywheel Publishing may receive compensation for actions taken through them.

United Continental CFO Leaves Instead of CEO — © Thinkstock

United Continental Holdings Inc. (NYSE: UAL) Chief Financial Officer Andrew Levy has left the company. Levy leaves behind one of the weakest large public corporation CEOs in America — Oscar Munoz. Munoz has presided over a number of public relations disasters that undermined its brands and probably cost him the board chair position. The performance of United has been poor against its peer group. Levy had been CFO for nearly two years. From appearances, it looks like Levy left in place of Munoz.

In the past year, United Continental’s shares are down 8% to $69.50. Shares of both American Airlines Group Inc. (NASDAQ: AAL) and Delta Air Lines Inc. (NYSE: DAL) have handily outperformed United’s.

The company’s SEC filing about the matter read:

On May 14, 2018, Andrew Levy, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of United Continental Holdings, Inc. (the “Company”), notified the Company of his intention to resign from the Company.

On May 16, 2018, the Board of Directors of the Company elected Gerald Laderman as Senior Vice President Finance and acting Chief Financial Officer of the Company.

[nativounit]

Mr. Laderman, age 60, has served as Senior Vice President Finance, Procurement and Treasurer of the Company since August 2016 and also served in this role from 2013 to August 2015. From August 2015 to August 2016, Mr. Laderman served as Senior Vice President Finance and acting Chief Financial Officer of the Company. From 2001 to 2010, Mr. Laderman served as senior vice president of finance and treasurer for Continental Airlines, Inc. (“Continental”). Mr. Laderman joined Continental in 1988 as senior director legal affairs, finance and aircraft programs. Prior to joining Continental, Mr. Laderman practiced law at the New York firm of Hughes Hubbard & Reed from 1982 to 1988. He holds a bachelor of arts degree from Dartmouth College and a juris doctor from the University of Michigan Law School.

Given his track record with United, it is odd that Laderman was not appointed permanent CFO. That was probably a Munoz decision.

[wallst_email_signup]

About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.