The parent of go! airlines said it expects to report a loss for its fiscal third quarter.

In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission yesterday, Phoenix-based Mesa Air Group Inc. disclosed that it expects to report a loss for the three months ending June 30 but the company said it could not quantify the size of the loss at this time.

The expected loss compares with a net profit of $2.6 million, or 8 cents, per share in the year-earlier period.

Shares of Mesa increased 2 cents to 53 cents on the Nasdaq stock market yesterday.

In its SEC filing, Mesa also said it will delay the filing of its financial report for its fiscal third quarter.

The reporting delay will be Mesa's third in a year. The company previously delayed the filing of its financials for the quarters ending Sept. 30 and Dec. 31.

The loss comes as Mesa's finances have deteriorated in recent months due to soaring fuel prices and a $52.5 million payment it made to Hawaiian Airlines to settle allegations that Mesa misused confidential corporate data.

Mesa also faces the prospect of losing its $20 million-a-month contract to fly regional service for Delta Air Lines. That dispute remains tied up in U.S. Federal Court in Atlanta.

During the past six months Mesa has earned a total of $5.2 million, or 53 cents per share, which compares with a loss of $15.9 million, or 49 cents per share, in the year-earlier quarter.

go! last week said it carried 1,640 more passengers in July this year compared to the same month the previous year, a 2.2 percent increase.

The go! planes were 70.4 percent full in July, compared to 82.7 percent in July 2007. The number of passengers per go! plane has declined since the airline added a sixth jet to its Hawai'i fleet following the collapse of Aloha Airlines.