The witch hunt for the masterminds behind the huge $2.47 billion profit that Qantas racked up recently goes into the Senate today. This is where chairman Richard Goyder and new CEO (former CFO) Vanessa Hudson will face a grilling for being accessories to the actions of former CEO Alan Joyce.

In case you missed it, Alan Joyce is nearly public enemy number one, as the media piles in on the former CEO knowing their customers, readers, viewers and listeners, who are all flyers are baying for blood!

Joyce’s former boss, Qantas chairman Richard Goyder has to be worried about his scalp and has started apologising for past bad behaviour of his company, while many are even pondering why Alan’s lieutenant, former CFO Vanessa Hudson has been given the gig.

The consensus answer is that hubris got Qantas into this jam, so what happens in the Senate today is bound to get ugly.

To make matters worse for Goyder (who was a champion CEO at Wesfarmers) is that the Qantas share price slumped yesterday as professional company analysts, who are doing the sums on brand name damage, consumer disdain for the airline and the litany of bad stories coming out about the business, are now downgrading the price target on the Qantas stock.

This is what happened over the past week:

Qantas (down 5.49%)

But what about the past six months as the big $2.47 billion profit emerged, along with $21.4 million Joyce was paid for his past year?

Qantas (down 20.6%)

Since July and August, the stock has been on the nose and is down over 20% over the past six months. This is bad news for Qantas shareholders and Richard Goyder, the chairman who’s supposed to look after his co-owners.

To make matters worse, as the SMH’s Amelia McGuire reported today: “Qantas released a market update on Monday flagging a $200 million increase to its fuel bill, $80 million in additional customer improvements, and a $50 million hit due to foreign exchange rate changes. The airline also said it may increase the price of airfares if the cost of fuel remained elevated in the coming weeks.”

If prices do go up, an already angry group of customers could turn into a lynch mob and Goyder and Hudson could swing!

But despite all that, analysts still like the company, as FNArena’s survey shows below:

The current share price is $5.10. It was $7.28 in 2019, but to be fair, when Joyce took over, the share price was around one lousy dollar!

Tough unlikeable CEOs can be terrible for staff and even customers, when the business is a price leader in a two-airline industry, but they can be good for shareholders, until they’re not.

And that’s when that CEO and all who supported him or her are usually shown the door!