Brightline lost less money last year than it did in 2024, but worries are mounting about its ability to stay solvent.
The private passenger train service "has stated that it does not currently have the liquid funds necessary to service its debt and meet such other obligations as they become due," wrote its outside auditor Ernst and Young, which prepared Brightline's 2025 financial statements.
Brightline has delayed its interest payments that were due earlier this year. Its grace period expires June 15. The company has been stating for months that it is working to secure funding by selling a portion of the business. It also acknowledged that it may be able to negotiate with its lenders more time to pay its IOUs and pay its interest in something other than cash, likely ownership stakes in the firm.
"However, substantial doubt remains as to the ability of the Company to continue as a going concern," Brightline wrote in its 2025 financial statement.
The service has more than $2 billion of long-term debt on which it is scheduled to pay more than $2.5 billion of interest over the next couple of decades. It is supposed to pay $117 million in interest this year, payments which have so far been deferred as it scrambles to raise cash.
"The numbers just don't work," said Joe Schwieterman, transportation professor at DePaul University. "It's certainly not due to chasing passengers away with late trains. The fundamentals are just so weak that we're likely going to see some big financial moves and they may not be good."
Brightline's liquidity has been an ongoing issue for months. Credit rating agencies have made a series of bond rating downgrades over the past year. A major agency, S&P Global, no longer provides a rating after cutting it further into junk bond territory earlier this year.
Revenue has been growing for Brightline. Sales totalled $214 million last year, a 14% increase, but only about half the growth expected.
"We think that switching riders from alternate modes, automotive in particular, is more challenging than originally forecast," S&P Global Managing Director Trevor D'Olier-Lees wrote in December.
The train service operating loss totaled $127 million last year, an improvement from the $153 million operating loss a year earlier. The company's total loss, made worse by interest payments, was $233 million. While that is only half what it lost a year earlier, Brightline also had less cash on hand. Its total cash position at the end of last year was $139 million, a 52% decline from a year earlier. Much of that cash was earmarked for bond interest payments.
Despite its financing problems, Brightline's business is growing, just not fast enough. Rides between Orlando and South Florida increased 16%. Regional rides between its five stations in South Florida grew 8%. It reconfigured its fleet and schedule in October to offer more frequent service for South Florida commuters.
Still, the average fare per person on its short haul routes fell and stayed about the same for its long distance service. While ridership was up, Brightline has found it difficult to raise average fares or attract more passengers faster to ride its rails.
The company hired Nicolas Petrovic as its CEO in January. He led the Eurostar service, which runs through the Channel Tunnel between the United Kingdom and France.
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