Three of 147: Two New Holders Are 61.9% of the Tracked American Airlines Stake. Its Insiders Have Never Bought a Share.

GetCoattail Research — The Filing Tape #149. American Airlines reports third-quarter results on October 22, and the stock rose 3.68% on October 20. The June filings show a tracked register rebuilt in one quarter: two of its three holders are new and hold 61.9% of the stake, its insiders have never bought a share in the parsed record, and the borrow has risen at five straight settlements.

The Hype

The attention is an earnings eve. American Airlines announced on October 1, 2026 that it will webcast its third-quarter results call on October 22 at 7:30 a.m. CT. American Airlines / GlobeNewswire Zacks' preview, published October 20, puts the report before the market open on October 22, with a consensus loss of 28 cents a share, revenues projected to rise 18.35% to $16.20 billion, and company guidance at a loss of 70 cents to 10 cents a share. Zacks The stock moved before the print: it last traded at $12.11 on October 20, up 3.68% from the previous close of $11.68, and the TrendEdge trending list checked October 21 carried it third, at +3.7% on volume of 59,791,174 shares, as airline shares rallied on a pullback in crude oil (methodology). Two weeks earlier, Reuters reported American intends to install SpaceX's Starlink satellite internet on its entire mainline fleet of over 1,000 aircraft from next year. Reuters Our own price file, which ends on October 2, tells the path into this week: the stock rose 68.2% in the second quarter, from $10.74 on March 31 to $18.07 on June 30, then closed at $12.94 on October 2 — down 28.4% from June 30 and 15.6% year to date. The filings answer who held it through that round trip.

The Tape

For American Airlines — the one hundred and forty-ninth Filing Tape audit — the tape shows a three-holder tracked register rebuilt by two genuine new entrants, a full market that added filers and shares, an insider record of sales with no purchases, no congressional row, a 5% register of just four passive filings, and a borrow up at five straight settlements.

Lens 1 — the superinvestors: three holders, two of them new, and the new labels check out. The collection holds 147 managers (144 at June 30; 3 early filers at September 30, none holding this name). The June 30, 2026 register is 3 distinct managers holding 21,729,430 shares worth $392,650,800, long only, with no option rows. As filed, the labels read 2 NEW and 1 INCREASED — and this audit tested the new labels rather than taking them on trust (methodology). Slate Path Capital is the largest holder: 8,276,584 shares worth $149,557,873 — 38.1% of the tracked stake — at a 2.07% weight, labelled INCREASED. That label verifies by two pairing methods: Slate Path rose from 6,471,684 shares at March 31 to 8,276,584, a rise of 27.9%. David Tepper - Appaloosa Management holds 7,500,000 shares (34.5% of the cohort, a 1.75% weight) and Harry Burn - Sound Shore holds 5,952,846 shares (27.4%, a 3.31% weight), both labelled NEW. Appaloosa's first-quarter filing is uniquely identified and contains no row for this name; Sound Shore's filing-agent prefix is shared, so its own first-quarter filing cannot be isolated — but the first-quarter register for this CUSIP holds exactly one row, Slate Path's 6,471,684 shares, leaving no room for a hidden first-quarter holding by either entrant (methodology). Together the two new holders hold 13,452,846 shares, 61.9% of the June cohort. No holder exited, and both registers reconcile: the register total rose 235.8%, from 6,471,684 shares to 21,729,430, and the gap between that figure and the verified continuing holder's +27.9% is, share for share, the two entrants. The June register implies $18.07, the June 30 close exactly. 13F figures are as of June 30, 2026, published up to 45 days later.

Lens 2 — institutions: more filers, 35.43% more shares, and a reported value that needs care. At June 30, 2026, 593 institutions reported positions on the name's single CUSIP, up 21 from 572 at March 31 (+3.67%); 574 are long. Reported shares rose 35.43% to 515,272,039 (+134,811,948 shares), and reported value rose 92.02% to $11,538,812,406, labelled "reported" because the aggregate includes option rows (methodology). Flow counts agree (551 entered, 530 exited, net +21), and the single-CUSIP aggregate matches the by-ticker total on every field. One caution belongs in the text: the aggregate implies $22.39 against the $18.07 close, a gap of 23.93% — last quarter it implied $15.79 against a $10.74 close, a gap of 47.07% — so this audit reads this lens by filer and share counts (methodology). At 4.22% of reported institutional shares, the tracked cohort is a sample, not the register itself.

Lens 3 — insiders: sales in every window, a purchase in none. The parsed Form 4 record holds 79 filings through October 2, 2026. The last 90 days hold 8 filings with no open-market purchase and 7 sale-coded rows across 229,245 shares worth $3,474,616.41, by 2 sellers — all 7 of them officer rows. The last year holds no purchase either, against 11 sale-coded rows across 443,146 shares worth $7,017,674.77, by 3 sellers, again all officer rows. Across the full record: 0 purchases by 0 buyers, against 12 sale-coded rows worth $7,907,987.24, by 3 sellers. The sale rows imply $15.16 over 90 days, $15.84 over one year and $15.97 over the full record, each inside its close range in our price file (methodology).

Lens 4 — Congress: no row anywhere. The combined and House aggregates (as of October 3, 2026) and the Senate aggregate (as of October 1, 2026) each carry no row for this name, and the House member file records no member with an American Airlines position line. This lens is blank in a specific sense: no transaction appears in the congressional collections as collected, which is an absence of a row, not a verified count of zero trades (methodology).

Lens 5 — the 5% register: four filings, all passive, and the maximum is the latest filing. Our full parse holds 4 SC 13D/G filings — 0 SC 13D family and 4 SC 13G family, 3 of them amendments; 3 reporter names across 4 rows. The maximum print is also the latest filing: PRIMECAP MANAGEMENT CO/CA/ at 69,186,424 shares and 10.46% as of May 31, 2026 (filed June 5, 2026, SC 13G/A); its prior print was 49,641,939 shares and 7.52% as of September 30, 2025. Vanguard Capital Management printed 33,750,505 shares and 5.11% as of March 31, 2026, while The Vanguard Group itself filed 0 shares as of March 13, 2026.

Lens 6 — short interest: up at five straight settlements, and up 58.3% since June 30. The latest FINRA settlement, September 15, 2026, records 91,609,119 shares sold short at 1.45 days to cover — 13.84% of the share count in our fundamentals file (methodology) — up 21.34% from the prior settlement and 58.3% above the June 30, 2026 settlement (57,852,431 shares). The borrow rose at each of the five settlements after June 30: 57,852,431 (June 30), 63,578,122 (July 15), 64,120,117 (July 31), 64,750,222 (August 14), 75,497,100 (August 31) and 91,609,119 (September 15). It remains 40.0% below the series maximum of 152,632,087 shares — but that maximum is the series' first settlement, January 15, 2021, so the distance from the peak is a five-year comparison, not a recent retreat (methodology).

The Gap

The narrative arriving this week is an earnings eve with a lowered bar: a consensus loss, a report due before Thursday's open, a one-day rise of 3.68% as oil pulled back, and a Starlink plan. The June tape — the most recent complete holdings picture — shows a tracked register rebuilt during the very quarter the price rose 68.2%. Two of its three holders were not there in March at all: their new labels survive both the per-manager audit and the register check, and their 13,452,846 shares are 61.9% of the cohort. The one continuing holder added 27.9%. The full market moved the same way on shares — up 35.43%, with 21 more filers — though its reported value, up 92.02%, overstates the move in a way the implied price exposes (methodology). The price gave back 28.4% by October 2, and over the same stretch the borrow rose at every settlement, from 57,852,431 shares at June 30 to 91,609,119 at September 15 — a 58.3% build while the stock fell. The insider record through October 2 is one-directional as a record: 12 sale-coded rows across the full parse and not one open-market purchase, ever, in the data we hold. Congress records nothing at all. The 5% register holds just four passive filings, and its largest holder, PRIMECAP at 10.46%, raised its print between September 2025 and May 2026. One plausible reading is that the June quarter's new money and the summer's growing borrow are two sides of the same repricing: the register added holders into a rising price, and the borrow built as the price came back down.

What Would Change the Picture

Nothing above is a recommendation. These filings would change it:

• 1. The 2026Q3 13F season (filing window closing mid-November 2026). The baseline is 3 June holders with 21,729,430 shares, of which two holders and 61.9% arrived that quarter. Whether Appaloosa (7,500,000 shares) and Sound Shore (5,952,846 shares) hold, add or exit after their first quarter, whether Slate Path (8,276,584 shares) adds again after its verified 27.9% rise, and whether any of the other 144 tracked managers opens a position, would each change this lens.
• 2. A first insider open-market purchase, or further sales in the earnings window. The parsed record holds 0 purchases across 79 filings, and the last 90 days to October 2 hold 7 sale-coded rows. A first purchase would break the record's one-directional pattern; sales filed after October 2 would extend it into the earnings period.
• 3. A first congressional row, in either chamber. The combined, House and Senate aggregates carry no row for this name and the House member file records none. Any purchase or sale in either chamber would change this lens from blank to populated.
• 4. A first SC 13D, or a passive print above 10.46%. All 4 filings are SC 13G family, and the largest print (PRIMECAP, 10.46% as of May 31, 2026) is also the latest filing. A first activist filing, or a new 13G print above 10.46%, would change this lens.
• 5. Short interest below 57,852,431 shares, or above 152,632,087 shares. Below the June 30, 2026 settlement would unwind the five-settlement build to 91,609,119 shares; above 152,632,087 would exceed the series maximum set at its first settlement in January 2021.

Related reading: Two of 147: One Holder Is 51.3% of the Tracked Braze Stake. Its Insiders Have Never Bought a Share.; Seven of 147: Viking Is 65.5% of the Tracked Boeing Stake — Labelled New, It Held 3,196,041 Shares in Q1. American Airlines' own page: American Airlines (AAL) on GetCoattail.

Methodology and data notes

• As-of & limits: The lenses rest on different clocks, none live: 13F is a June 30, 2026 snapshot published up to 45 days later; Form 4 runs through October 2, 2026; Congress aggregates run through October 3, 2026 (Senate through October 1, 2026); 13D/G through June 5, 2026; short interest through September 15, 2026; the price file ends October 2, 2026. Nine limits are specific to this audit. First, the roster expanded before the recent audits — from 85 managers (83 filing) to 149 (147 filing) — so "of 147" counts are not comparable to earlier pieces' "of 83" figures. Second, this name carries a single CUSIP (02376R102, common stock), and the full-market by-CUSIP row matches the by-ticker aggregate on every field — holders, long holders, shares, reported value, prior holders and prior reported value — so no CUSIP blending question arises. Third, the tracked register's change labels are verified, not taken on trust, and this name is the mirror of the label error caught in recent audits: its two NEW labels appear to be genuine. The continuing holder was verified by two pairing methods — accession-prefix matching and accession identity plus CUSIP-overlap (29 overlapping CUSIPs, uniquely paired) — with its label recomputing exactly (Slate Path Capital, +27.9% on 6,471,684 first-quarter shares). Appaloosa's first-quarter filing is uniquely identified by its accession prefix (a single first-quarter accession; 19 overlapping CUSIPs) and contains no row for this CUSIP. Sound Shore's prefix (0001193125) is a shared filing-agent prefix with six first-quarter accessions, so the per-manager pairing cannot isolate its filing; the register check closes the question instead — the March 31 pipeline register for this CUSIP holds exactly one row totalling 6,471,684 shares, Slate Path's verified position, so neither new entrant held this name in the tracked first-quarter register. The registers then reconcile exactly: the June 30 register holds 21,729,430 shares, equal to the June cohort with no remainder, because none of the three September 30 early filers holds this name. The verified continuing change of +27.9% and the register-to-register change of +235.8% therefore differ by design: the difference is the two genuine entrants' combined 13,452,846 shares. Fourth, the full-market aggregate implies $22.39 against the June 30 close of $18.07 (+23.93%), and implied $15.79 against the March 31 close of $10.74 in the prior quarter (+47.07%): the aggregate is a reported sum that includes option rows, so its implied price need not equal the close — but gaps of this size are why this audit uses filer counts and share counts as this lens's primary measures and reports the value as reported only. The tracked register, which holds no option rows in this name, implies the close exactly. Fifth, the insider record contains no purchase in any window, so no implied purchase price exists. The implied sale prices ($15.16 over 90 days, against a $12.70–$17.75 close range; $15.84 over one year, against $10.18–$18.15; $15.97 over the full record, against $9.07–$25.82) sit inside their ranges. The site's 90-day insider aggregate (dated October 21, 2026) prints 0 purchases, 7 sale-coded rows worth $3,474,616.41 and 2 sellers — exactly the full parse's 90-day totals despite its window ending nineteen days later, on October 21, 2026. This audit cites the full parse as primary and records the match. Sixth, the Congress lens is an absence, stated as such: the combined aggregate (as of October 3, 2026), the House aggregate (October 3, 2026), the Senate aggregate (October 1, 2026) and the House member file (politicians_members.json, as of October 3, 2026; window: 2026 House PTR filings, transactions dated on or after April 1, 2026) all carry no row for this name. An absent row means no transaction appears in the collections as collected; it is not a verified zero. Seventh, the 5% register's cross-date share total of 152,578,868 is an arithmetic sum of reporter rows across different as-of dates, not a current combined stake. With only four rows the register has no joint-reporting duplication, but the Vanguard names still have to be read by reporter name, not consolidated by group: The Vanguard Group filed 0 shares as of March 13, 2026, while Vanguard Capital Management printed 33,750,505 shares and 5.11% as of March 31, 2026. Parsed totals match the aggregates exactly. Eighth, the short-interest series needs no split adjustment: our price file records no split for this name, the series holds no split-flagged row, and no settlement step reaches 2x or falls to one-half (largest step 1.564x, May 31, 2024; smallest 0.638x, January 29, 2021); two rows carry a FINRA revision flag (June 15, 2021 and August 31, 2023). The series maximum is its first settlement (January 15, 2021), so every "below peak" figure in this audit is dated to that settlement wherever it is used. The issuer-name field reads "American Airlines Group Inc. C" at all 137 settlements, on a single market class (NNM) throughout. Ninth, the share count behind the short-interest percentage carries a file-field anomaly: our fundamentals file records 661,969,951 shares outstanding, against which the latest borrow is 13.84%, but its shares_end field reads 2027-07-17 — a date after every as-of in this audit, and the only 2027-dated shares_end in the file. The count itself is used as collected: it is consistent with the 5% register, where PRIMECAP's 69,186,424 shares at 10.46% imply a share count of the same size. The company's fundamentals as collected print fiscal 2025 revenue of $54,633,000,000, net income of $111,000,000 and assets of $61,774,000,000 (fiscal year ended December 31, 2025); those figures are reported as collected and are not used in any lens above. Every price statement from our own file is mechanical, a date and a close. The earnings-week figures in The Hype — the October 20, 2026 last traded price of $12.11, the 3.68% rise and the 59,791,174-share volume — are outlet figures published after our price file ends, and are cited as such, not blended into file-based calculations.
• Market context sources: American Airlines Group via GlobeNewswire, "American Airlines Group announces webcast of third-quarter 2026 financial results", published October 1, 2026 (the company will webcast a live audio feed of its third-quarter 2026 financial results conference call on October 22 at 7:30 a.m. CT). Zacks, "American Airlines Stock to Report Q3 Earnings: What's in the Cards?", published October 20, 2026 (scheduled to report third-quarter 2026 results on October 22, before market open; consensus loss of 28 cents a share; revenues projected to rise 18.35% to $16.20 billion; company guidance for the quarter between a loss of 70 cents and a loss of 10 cents a share; higher fuel, labor and airport costs against solid bookings). Reuters, "American Airlines extends Starlink Wi-Fi roll-out to entire mainline fleet", published October 8, 2026 (American intends to install SpaceX's Starlink satellite internet on its entire primary fleet of over 1,000 aircraft from next year, extending a plan already in place for roughly half the fleet; the roll-out will now include over 530 Boeing aircraft as well; financial terms not disclosed). GlobalBankingAndFinance, "American Airlines Group rises 3.68% in Tuesday's session", published October 20, 2026, citing an Eulerpool snapshot (last traded price $12.11, 3.68% higher than the previous close of $11.68 on October 20, 2026; the figure is a last traded price, not the exchange's official closing price). Defense World, "American Airlines Group Inc. (NASDAQ:AAL) Stock Rated 'Hold' by Sell-Side Brokerages", published October 21, 2026, reporting MarketBeat data (shares trading up 3.7%; trending headlines summary: airline shares rallied as crude oil prices pulled back, and American outperformed larger rivals United Airlines and Delta Air Lines during the session). TrendEdge trending list, checked October 21, 2026 (American third among trending names, behind covered IREN and covered BRZE, at +3.7% on volume of 59,791,174 shares; below it sat a leveraged ETF, HTZ, covered CLF, RKT, KEY, WIT and covered GM). Google Trends U.S. coverage (TS2 mirror of Google Trends, checked October 21, 2026) was also checked for this audit: its top U.S. single-stock items were SPCX (skipped — new listing, partial fundamentals), ISRG (covered, #146), BA (covered, #147) and TTWO (covered), with WIX appearing as a U.S. item that the live TrendEdge list ranked below American — WIX is recorded as outranked, not skipped. Figures we could not confirm were left out; the external items above are reported speech from those outlets, not GetCoattail measurements.
• American Airlines is in the GetCoattail stock-page universe: American Airlines (AAL) stock page. Series data: aal_lens_data.csv · aal_short_interest_series.csv. Earlier audits: Braze · Boeing.

Past patterns are not a promise of future results. For education only — not investment advice.

This article describes public filings as of the dates stated. It is not investment advice and makes no recommendation. Filings lag reality: 13F positions are as of June 30, 2026, and later trading is not yet public.

Revision history: v1.0 — October 21, 2026: first publication.