American Airlines just had its best quarter in company history

American Airlines just reported the highest quarterly profits in company history.

The airline returned $1.9 billion in profits at $2.77 per share - beating analysts expectations of $2.72.

Although revenue fell 3.9% to $10.7 billion, costs decreased almost 12%.

For the quarter, the airline reported pretax margins of 17.7% - a record for American.

Much of the drop in expenses come from a 43.7% fall in fuel costs compared to the same period last year for a savings of $1.2 billion in cash.

Over the first three quarters of the 2015, American Airlines has seen fuel expenses fall 41.3% versus 2014 or $3.5 billion in cash savings.

Over the past year, crude oil prices have been cut in half.

During the quarter, American took delivery of 16 new aircraft and retired 30 older, fuel guzzling Boeing 757, 767, and MD80 aircraft.

American's fellow US legacy carriers - United and Delta - also reported massive fuel savings.

In the third quarter, American Airlines returned $1.63 billion to investors, mostly through a $1.5 billion stock repurchase.

This month, American completed its two-year-long merger with US Airways by combining reservation systems. The two carriers merged fleets earlier this year.