The December Report was dated January 31, 2024, and posted on
February 1 , 2023. This is early for Amtrak.
The NEC generated for the year so far a cash operating surplus of
$83.784 million (as determined by their accounting system), and the remainder
of the system had an operating cash loss of $202. 908 million. Combined, the
entire system had, for the period, a cash operating deficit of $119.124
million.
In Year to date, the NEC made debt service payments totaling $32.6
million and capital expenditures of $371.8 million. Counting all capital
sources, the NEC Account has a positive balance of $62.6 million. It also
has cash reserves that are unused from previous years.
For the rest of the National System, $0.02 million was needed for Debt
service, and $222.4 million was spent on Capital Expenditures. The National
Network Account Balance now has a negative balance of $73.3 million. It
also has the accumulated surplus from previous years.
The amount of appropriated money for the combined NEC and The National Network received for the year to date was $531.5 million. Amtrak has also
received from other capital sources $209.8 million for the entire system.

The combined accumulated reserves at the beginning of the 2024 fiscal year
totaled $254 million in cash and cash equivalents, $222 million in short-term investments, and $3.2 billion in available-for-sale securities. This brings total cash reserves as of October 1, 2023, to $3.7 billion. The current ratio (Current Assets divided by Current Liabilities) was 1.98, making Amtrak quite credit-worthy for any fresh borrowings. Note that in order to increase “the transparency” of Amtrak accounting, instead of reporting in thousands of dollars, the report should be in millions of dollars rounded to the nearest million. It also makes it more difficult to reconcile to other items reported monthly, which are usually in the nearest thousands of dollars.
In October 2023, Amtrak’s burn rate (Operating Revenues-Minus Operating
Expense-Minus Debt Service-Capital Expenditures) was $278.6 million.
- November, the burn rate was $247.7 million.
- December, the burn rate was $185.7 million.
- In their tradition of changing reporting of Capital Spending for the year
  to date, a number of categories have been renamed and gathered into larger
  categories:
  - Capital Renewal(Engineering): $247.1 million
  - Mechanical: $94.7 million
  - Operations $1.8 million
  - Digital Technology $70.7 million
  - Commercial and Marketing is no longer listed as separate
    category.
  - ADA was $31.5 million
  - Real Estate Stations & Facilities $17.3 million
  - Amtrak Police & Emergency Management was $3.5 million
  - Safety $0.6 million
  - Environmental $1.3 million
  - Procurement and other $5.4 million
  - Acela 21: $28.4 million
  - Gateway $57.0 million.
  - Real Estate, Strategy & Planning (Planning & Strategy) -$36.8 million
  - B&P Tunnel $24.5 million
  - Intercity Trainsets: $11.7 million
  - Total was $600.2 million, which is $55.0 million more than the same period last year.
  - Real Estate, Strategy & Planning must have much of its spending from FY2023 and October reclassified, or Amtrak must sell some real estate. Gateway spending decreased by $20.8 million in December. These items cast doubt on how accurate these figures are.
  - .The GAAP Loss for the year so far appears to be $383.8 million, which is $16.5 million better than FY2023. The cash operating earnings for the year was $17.5 million, better than in FY2023.
  - The corporation is $13.6 million for cash operating earnings ahead of its Forecast. The GAAP figure is $18.4 million, better than the Forecast. It appears that the month of December was favorable to expectations, whereas November was not.
  - The number of product lines showing a measurable operating surplus for the period was 7. The five with a surplus over $1 million were:
  - Northeast Regional $49.3 million
  - Acela $39 6 million
  - Hoosier State $2.0 million
  - Auto Train $1.8 million
  - Cascades $1.5 million
  - The Hoosier State (which has not run for several years) is still shown as profitable to the tune of $2.0 million and listed as one of those seven profitable operations.
  - The four Virginia product lines generated a total loss of $7.4 million.
  - Amtrak is now showing costs based on Frequency Variable Costs, Route Variable Costs, and System Fixed Costs. Most trains covered their Frequency Variable Costs. The exception were all of the long-distance trains, not including the Auto train, Silver Meteor, Lake Shore Ltd., Capitol Ltd.,
  - Crescent, and Palmetto. The Gulf Coast Ltd., which has not started running, is shown as not meeting its variable costs.
  - Ridership for the Fiscal Year so far is more than 1,403,400 from
    FY2023. For the year, it stands at 8,354.800 (Amtrak reports ridership to the nearest 100). In fact, the total number of riders in December was 2,692.400. The situation with the long-distance trains shows a gain of riders across most product lines, except the Coast Starlight, Capitol Ltd., Sunset Ltd., and Auto Train. The Capitol can be explained by the starvation level of its consist, though it is starting to catch up to previous years. The Coast Starlight was annulled for various reasons. The Auto Train had record ridership in FY2023, so it has reverted to previous levels. The Palmetto was the biggest winner at a +31.9% gain in the new fiscal year so far. The Silver Meteor was a close second at a 31.2% gain. The line that showed the smallest ridership gains after those two was the California Zephyr, with a 6.8% gain. The Acela gained 11.5%.
  - Neither house of Congress has approved any further appropriations bills. Another Continuous Resolution (CR) was passed, extending the dates through early March. The appropriators approved the top-line figures for all twelve budget categories a week ago, but this has not budged any more into formal legislations let alone having them reach the floor of either house. The Senate will be debating this week a supplemental appropriation containing border controls and money for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. The house, who knows?
    
    Steve Musen

RI Association of Railroad Passengers