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By DAVID KOENIG, AP Airlines Writer David Koenig, Ap Airlines Writer – 42 mins ago

DALLAS – Continental Airlines Inc. lost money in the third quarter as business travelers stayed home, causing a nosedive in airline revenue.

But not everything was bleak for Continental. Traffic picked up in September, even if it took cheap fares to get them on board.

...

Revenue plunged 20.2 percent, to $3.32 billion.

Continental blamed the revenue downturn on business travelers, who were flying less and buying cheaper coach tickets due to the recession.

Overall traffic declined less than 1 percent compared with the same period last year, and planes were more full than last year. But many of those passengers only responded to cheap fares, and they weren't buying high-priced tickets in first or business class.

The weak sales cut across all of Continental's markets, with trans-Atlantic business particularly sluggish.

Continental caught a break from falling jet fuel prices. The average price of a gallon of fuel fell 48.4 percent from a year ago, and with fewer flights, the airline burned 5.1 percent less fuel.

Continental said the percentage of seats booked over the next six weeks is flat to up 1 percentage point compared with last year for most of its routes, and up 4 to 5 points on trans-Atlantic routes. In other words, things aren't getting worse, but there's not much evidence of an impending rebound in travel either.

...emphasis above is mine.