In an interesting bit of timing, speaking of that contract with Emery, a federal judge ruled yesterday that the US Postal Service was guilty of not paying Emery money it owes under the mail-sorting agreement between the two.

Fedex--take note.

In other news of note today, the Wall Street Journal reported today that Fed Ex and the US Postal Service are apparently close to a new agreement that would allow FedEx to carry US Postal parcels on FedEx aircraft. It is assumed that this contract would replace one that the USPS currently has with Emery Worldwide, which on Friday asked that a US Court of Federal Claims stop the post office from awarding the business to FedEx.

In other news today, FedEx appears to be one step closer to an agreement with the Post Office to carry US Mail, after a court said today that Emery Worldwide had no ground to stop such an agreement from taking place. Shares of FedEx ended down 2% today, closing at 42.27.

This is good news for FedEx, but bad news for Emery, which currently has a contract valued at about $200 million a year with the Post Office to carry mail. Emery told the court that it expected the Post Office would cancel this agreement in 2002, if in fact, it was to strike a new deal with FedEx. Hey guys, I have news for you. What does NSynch say? Bye bye bye.

In other bright and cheery news, the FAA shut down the cargo operations of Emery on Monday. Again, this move really should not come as much of a surprise, in that the FAA has been investigating the airline for over a year for numerous maintenance-related issues. Rumors have been hot and heavy for weeks that a shutdown was in the works.

However, our take on this shutdown is that we suspect management of the airline is happy. We doubt if Emery will ever fly its own planes again. After the 30 days are up, I will be surprised if Emery has made a serious effort to put its operation right.

As we had talked about in PlaneBusiness Banter a few weeks ago, CNF Transportation, the parent company of Emery had been trying to unload the company. But no takers could be found.

The company has already fired many of its employees, and has said that it will continue in operation, using third-party aircraft.

As I said, I think management at Emery could probably care less whether they are ever allowed to fly again or not. It does appear that they can do what they need to do, using other resources.

Whew....isn't that just a lot of pleasant news for one evening?