It could have been worse.

That's how investors seemed to greet Southwest Airlines' prediction that it'll take a $150 million hit to its first quarter revenue from flight cancellations caused by the grounding of Boeing 737 Max 8 jets, its contract fight with mechanics and severe winter storms.

Even though major trading markets closed down Wednesday, the Dallas-based carrier's shares rose 2.2 percent. American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Continental also were up for the day.

"There's a little bit of relief that it wasn't worse," said George Ferguson, an analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence. "The market, after the beating the airlines have taken, says it isn't terrible and maybe we're getting some of the bad news out and are ready for better news."

The bad news came out before trading opened Wednesday.

In a regulatory filing, Southwest revealed it's canceled 9,400 flights from mid-February to the end of March because of the 737 Max groundings, reduced service during contract talks with mechanics and major winter storms that crippled flights to the East Coast and Midwest.

Most of the cancellations — about 3,800 — were weather-related, but the company said 2,800 resulted from taking its 34 Max planes out of service starting March 13. It attributed 2,800 other cancellations to mechanics grounding planes during labor negotiations.

Southwest reached an agreement with its mechanics union, the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association, a few days after the Max grounding that would give mechanics $160 million in retroactive pay and a 20 percent raise effective April 1. The airline had sued the union, alleging mechanics engaged in an illegal work slowdown.

The airline said it's actively managing flight cancellations to minimize passenger disruptions. Southwest operates about 4,000 flights a day, including 130 on the grounded Max model.

Southwest also revised its first-quarter growth estimate from 3.5 percent to 1 percent.

Aviation authorities around the world grounded all Boeing 737 Max 8 aircraft after the deadly Ethiopian Airlines crash earlier this month that killed 157 people. Boeing is expected to release a software update for its aircraft this week that would address automated flight control functions suspected in both the Ethiopian Airlines crash and a Lion Air crash that killed 189 in October.

The Chicago-based aerospace giant held a set of meetings Wednesday with representatives from nearly every corner of the global aviation industry. The company invited more than 200 pilots, technical leaders, airline representatives and regulators.

Southwest, which expects to receive 41 more 737 Max 8 planes from Boeing in the next year, acknowledged uncertainty around when the grounding order will be lifted by the Federal Aviation Administration. It said further impact on revenue beyond the first quarter is possible.

Fort Worth-based American Airlines, which had been making 90 daily flights with the plane, said Monday it couldn't forecast the related cost.

Bloomberg News contributed to this story.