These are the items that I noticed in the report that were interesting to me:

Ridership in October increased from September which is very unusual.
The report was dated November 24, 2020 and posted by November 28, 2020. This was early, especially by Amtrak standards.
The NEC generated for the first month a cash operating loss of $40.6 million (as determined by their accounting system) and the remainder of the system had a fully allocated cash loss of $54.6 million. Combined the entire system had for the month a cash operating deficit of $95.1 million.
For the month, the NEC made debt service payments totaling $0.9 million and capital expenditures of $77.4 million. Counting all capital sources, the NEC Account has a negative balance of $73.7 million plus the cash reserves from FY2018, FY2019 and FY2020.
For the rest of the National System, only $0.1 million was needed for Debt service and $42.9 million was spent on Capital Expenditures. The National Network Account Balance is now a negative $70.207 million. Keep in mind that a large surplus was built up in FY2018, FY2019 and FY 2020.
Amtrak had a cash balance of approximately $2,487,304,000 at the beginning of Fiscal 2020. At the end of the year there was still approximately $1,135,208,000 in the combined accounts for the current fiscal year, which one assumes is mostly cash in the bank and short term money market investments which can be liquidated at any time. Amtrak's burn rate (that is operating revenue minus operating expense minus debt service minus capital expenditures) for October was $216,413,000. Assuming that the burn rate will not exceed $325 million per month, Amtrak should be able to function at the current rate of expenditures for the next 10 months, even without any further appropriations from Congress. However, with the Continuing Resolution running through December 11, 2020 Amtrak was appropriated an additional $394.5 million which would extend that period at least an additional month and the end of the 2021 fiscal year.
Amtrak changed considerably the method of reporting its capital expenditures, making it even more opaque than before. The new categories are: Engineering $65.3 million, Mechanical $21.3 million, Operations $0.7 million, IT $5.3 million, Commercial and Marketing $2.9 million, ADA & Stations was $14.0 million, Safety was $0.8 million, Procurement was $0.2 million, Acela 21 was $8.1 million, Planning was $1.5 million, and Intercity Trainsets was $0.3 million. Total capital expense was $120.3 million.
The GAAP Loss for the month appears to be $175.1 million which is $163.3 million worse than the comparable period in FY2020. The operating earnings for the month was $118.6 million worse than FY2020.
The number of product lines showing a measurable operating surplus for the period went up to 10 despite losing money on the Acelas. The one with a surplus over $1 million was:
- Pennsylvanian $1.5 million
The four Virginia product lines generated a net total of $0.2 million. (The Virginia services being beneficiaries of the accounting system.
Ridership for the month fell more than 2,169,600 from the comparable period in FY2020. For the year to date, it stands at 685,4XX (Amtrak rounds to the nearest 100). In fact, the total number of riders in all of October was 685,4XX. The situation with the long distance trains shows a loss of riders for all of the product lines. The City of New Orleans was able to eke out the title of the greatest loser at -74.5% for the fiscal year. Runner up was the Crescent at -72.1% The line with the least amount of loss in the Long Distance Category was the Auto Train at -28.7%. The Auto Train is the only long distance train running daily.
Congress is negotiating an Omnibus bill covering all 12 budget bills. A compromise was reached in the top-line for each department, so it is now up to the chairs of the appropriation subcommittees to negotiate with their counterparts the individual titles. There are some snags, so it is possible that a very short term Continuous Resolution (CR) make get passed.
A group of 8 or more senators and at least 50 members of the house announce a bi-partisan stimulus package of around $908 billion. This package does contain around $45 billion in relief for transportation including $1 billion for Amtrak. Speaker Pelosi and Minority Leader Schumer have agreed to use that package as a starting point in negoiations. President Elect Biden is also agreeable to the package for relief now. (He would submit another request next spring for additional relief). President Trump has indicated to Senator Graham that he could sign the bill. However, Senate Majority Leader McConnell has been non-committal and has not even said whether the package could come up for a vote. However, he is under pressure from his caucus to negotiate some kind of relief and therefore has spoken to Speaker Pelosi.
If a compromise is reached on a stimulus package, it could be voted on separately or, made part of the Omnibus Appropriations. If no compromise is made, it may be allowed to die without any votes taken.
Both Moderna and Pfizer had successful stage III trials and have now applied to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for emergency authorization. So far, Pfizer has been approved in Great Britain for emergency use. A decision on Pfizer in the United States is expected on December 11, 2020 or shortly thereafter, and a decision on Moderna the following week. If approved, the two companies would have enough doses in stock to begin 20 million vaccinations by the end of 2020. However, not all of their vaccine would be directed towards the USA. Hopefully sufficient vaccine would be available by mid-January to vaccinate the 21 million health care workers in the US and the 2 million residents of nursing homes and assisted living facilities. Decisions still have to be made on who would be next in line. Meanwhile the virus is running amok with well over 100,000 persons a day becoming infected.

Steve Musen. Representative from Rhode Island to NARP's Council of Representatives

RI Association of Railroad Passengers