One of the less obvious concerns about the retiring of the A380 would be the write down of all the infrastructure that Airbus invested in to be able to build these planes. It does seem like the "future of flight" is efficient, smaller, twin jets rather than these 'super tankers' of the sky.
One of the interesting tours you can go on in Everett WA is the Boeing 'Future of Flight' tour where you see the building where they are now building 777 and 787's but were originally building 747s. The adaptations to handle the smaller aircraft are pretty creative but the costs larger tooling is just written off. On a program that lived as long as the 747 has that isn't a big deal, but when you've only made 20% of the planes you expected to make? I would think that has to hurt your profitability.
One of the interesting tours you can go on in Everett WA is the Boeing 'Future of Flight' tour where you see the building where they are now building 777 and 787's but were originally building 747s. The adaptations to handle the smaller aircraft are pretty creative but the costs larger tooling is just written off. On a program that lived as long as the 747 has that isn't a big deal, but when you've only made 20% of the planes you expected to make? I would think that has to hurt your profitability.