This is the first week without finance classes. That might explain why my mind is playing tricks on me. After a weekend stuck in airports waiting for Ryan Air flights to take off, I had time to represent the reality of flying with that company in financial terms.

As per my image, flying Ryan Air has the same payoffs as writing a call. Instead of the “option price”, the customer gets “the savings from the ticket” (compared to other airlines). Then the exercise price is the time they tell you the flight is going to take off. In this special type of options, maturity is when the plane actually takes off and price at maturity is the time that the plane takes off.

The profit? If the plane happens to take off in time, it is good. All the savings are yours (see smiling face). As the plane gets delayed, 15min, the writer of the option (the customer) is still smiling, but a little bit less enthusiastically, because he/she is wasting time.

After 30min, there is no smile in the face. We reach the break even point: “If I knew I was going to be delayed like this, I would never ever buy this ticket.” But things get worse, after 1h you get the suspicious look “Do these people own any planes?”, then anger, then despair and then desolation.

This weekend, I had a political family meeting, back in Spain. Guess what, even if the flight time is about 2h, I spent more time waiting for the planes to take off than actually flying. 5h30 stuck in airports! And every time I book with Ryan Air exactly the same thing happens. Delays are guaranteed!
It’s official: I am done and not flying with Ryan Air anymore!