Air Asia X, whats going on?

From the Edge:

KUALA LUMPUR: AirAsia X Bhd fell as much as 6.7% to emerge among the most actively traded stocks as investors reacted to a report by The Edge Financial Daily on the airlines financial constraints. The Edge Financial Daily, quoting sources, reported yesterday that the long-haul low-cost carrier faced difficulties in paying staff wages.

Describing the unprecedented payment issue as a temporary setback, the management of AirAsia X blamed the payment delay to the late arrival of incoming funds. It was also reported that Tan Sri Tony Fernandes, AirAsia Bhd co-founder and group chief executive officer, was planning to play a more active role in AirAsia X. 

AirAsia X reported some nasty losses.  I see a lot of finger pointing.  But what is really wrong?  Are they pricing wrongly, is their strategy not working?  It seems no one really knows.

I think the problem is really simple.  It actually starts from my own personal experience with the airline.  I flew on AirAsia X to Sydney and back to Kuala Lumpur from Melbourne.  The plane was quite full.  The experience I felt was decent, although the food was the worst I ever had on an airline.  No problem because it's also the cheapest flight I ever took to and from Australia.

The flight attendants are an upgrade over the regular AirAsia flight attendants.  But still not as professional as Singapore airlines.  Their business model is quite solid.

But there is one thing I felt mad about.  one:  the flight I had originally wanted to take was cancelled and I was moved to the following time slot.  The exact same thing happened for the flight back from Australia.  This not only disrupted my schedule, but also my relatives who were dropping me off at the airport.  But, I'm thinking it's usual for airlines to do this as my brother had the same problem with his Cathay Pacific flight to Malaysia.

After seeing the AirAsiaX losses, I didn't think the cancelled flight was a usual occurrence.  It's apparent that AirAsiaX had expanded too fast and too aggressively, adding capacity even though the demand was not yet there, hence the cancelled flights.

I don't have a strong conclusion, but perhaps the flight industry is due for some hard times.  I don't really see a way for AirAsiaX to claw its way out of this mess, especially if they have obligations to purchase new aircraft.  Deferring those obligations will cost a bomb.