Qantas comes to mind. On the eve of its December half profit report, its share price is a testament to contrarian investing.

On Thursday the group is expected to post a pre-tax December half profit of between $300 million and $350 million that caps its most turbulent period ever.

It began in 2012, when Virgin Australia began chasing business flyers, and also opened itself up to foreign ownership and what is now a combined 70 per cent stake for Air New Zealand, Singapore Airlines and Etihad.

Who fired the first shot in what became a bloody market share war is in dispute, but both groups were wounded.

Virgin posted an underlying loss of $212 million and a statutory loss of $356 million in the year to June 2014, and last week announced an underlying profit of $10 million and a statutory loss of $45.4 million for the December 2014 half.

Qantas posted a pre-tax loss of $646 million and a loss including writedowns of $2.8 billion in the year to June 2014.The group had by that time abandoned its doctrinaire defence of a 65 per cent domestic market share, however. The market share war was easing, and a three-year $2 billion cost-cutting program was under way.

The Abbott government had also removed some foreign ownership restrictions on Qantas, albeit not to the point where its register was as open to foreign investment as Virgin's, and both airlines were about to hit a profit updraft – a decline on fuel costs that accompanied the oil price plunge from October onwards.

Qantas' shares went from $1.30 to $1.47 in two days after the August loss announcement. At Wednesday's closing price of $2.81 they were up 93 per cent since the end of September, outstripping a 29 per cent increase for Virgin shares.

Structural cost cuts, a fall in fuel costs that benefits Qantas more than Virgin this year and the easing of the market share battle have all played a part, and the bounce since September 30  has been so strong that it has vindicated contrarian investors – the ones who, like Rockefeller, believe in buying when others are selling.

Qantas was a one-company horror headline machine between the middle of 2012 and the August 2014 loss announcement. The board and chief executive Alan Joyce came under considerable pressure.

With Qantas shares where they are now, however, investors who bought in at every diabolical turn are ahead of those who invested in Virgin, and also ahead of the industrial share sector of the sharemarket.

Those who bought Qantas at the beginning of the 2012 as the storm was brewing are sitting on a return of 90 per cent now, beating Virgin's return of 72 per cent, and also beating a 55 per cent return for industrial shares.

Qantas shares are up 140 per cent since June 2012, when the group shocked the market by revealing that its 2011-2012 profit would be literally decimated, to less than $100 million. Virgin's gain over the same period is 17 per cent. The industrial section of the market is up 53 per cent.

Qantas' gain since December 5 2013 when it predicted a loss of $250 million to $350 million in the December 2013 half year and announced a three-year, $2 billion emergency cost-cutting drive is 159 per cent, compared to 27 per cent for Virgin and 26 per cent for the industrials.

Its shares have doubled since its its August 28 mega-loss announcement last year: Virgin's shares have risen 19 per cent over the same time, and the industrials are up 11 per cent.

The lesson? I am not sure there is an overarching one. Stock picking can be perilous, and Qantas got an unexpected boost when the oil price plunged. Virgin boss John Borghetti also says Virgin has built a 20 to 25 per cent share of the lucrative business and government market, and is on its way to 30 per cent. It could be that the market share war is over because Borghetti has got what he wants.

The potential impact of the cost cuts Joyce is pushing through was probably overshadowed by negative news surrounding Qantas until the final quarter of last year, however. The cuts will get star treatment in the December half profit announcement, and the interim result should position Joyce to cut costs by about $650 million in the year to June 2015. That would leave another $1.2 billion of cuts to be captured over the next 18 months, an amount that if crystalised would give added support to airline group's share price.