In the United States and Europe, two of the world’s largest and most high-profile aviation markets, airline ownership is relatively straightforward. There are pretty much two options for the structure that guides how an airline is owned. For starters, a carrier can be privately owned, with a single private individual or company being the unique proprietor of an air operator, with the latter of the two being far more popular. Airlines are extremely large, complex companies, and owning one requires an immense amount of capital, something that a single company is relatively unlikely to be able to provide.