BOEING: FUNDAMENTAL ANALYSIS + PRICE ACTION |SHORT VIEW 🔔

2 Sep 2021

After a significant portion of commercial airplane orders faded in 2019 and 2020, Boeing began to rebuild its production backlog in 2021. The aircraft producer has reported positive net orders for six straight months. The company will likely prolong that sequence to seven months when it announces its August order activity next week.

However, compared to Airbus, Boeing's order book still looks pale due to the A320neo family's advantage over the 737 MAX. This week, Airbus received an important order from Jet2.com, an old-time BA client, a British travel airline. This setback underscores the fact that the U.S. aerospace giant is still struggling.

In recent years, Airbus has persistently kept an advantage over Boeing in terms of orders, especially in the narrow-body segment. But the gap widened when Airbus bought a majority stake in the CSeries aircraft program - now known as the A220 - in 2018, and widened productively after the Boeing 737 MAX was banned from flying two years ago.

As of the end of 2015, Boeing had 4,392 firm orders for the 737 family, while Airbus had 5,535 direct orders for the rival A320 family. This gave Airbus a 56% share of orders for narrow-body aircraft between the two leading aircraft manufacturers, a substantial benefit but merely an authoritative position. Two years later, Airbus' share has risen to 57%.

But by the end of July this year, orders for Boeing's narrow-body aircraft had dropped to 3,314, largely because a string of orders for the 737 MAX had faded over the past couple of years. Meantime, Airbus ended the month with 6,100 firm orders for narrow-body aircraft, with the A320neo family accounting for more than 90% of that portfolio. That brings Airbus' share of orders for the two competitors' narrow-body aircraft to 65%.

For most of its history, Jet2.com has operated exclusively Boeing aircraft. Today it has about 90 aircraft in its fleet, almost all of them Boeing 737s.

Last year, however, Jet2 tried leasing an A321. Apparently, the leisure-oriented airline liked what it saw. On Tuesday, Jet2 and Airbus announced that the airline had placed a direct order for 36 A321neos with options for 24 more. That proved initial Reuters reports that Jet2 was on the verge of switching to Airbus. Jet2 said the planes would be delivered within five years, through 2028.

Airbus probably offered big discounts to poach Jet2 from Boeing. However, the A321neo's superior capabilities over the 737 MAX 9 and 737 MAX 10 gave it the opportunity to win this business. Jet2 will equip its A321neo with 232 seats, slightly more than the 737 MAX 10's maximum capacity of 230. In addition, the A321neo can operate from shorter runways than the 737 MAX 9 or 737 MAX 10, giving Jet2 more operational flexibility.

Jet2's decision to replace dozens of Boeing aircraft with the A321neo shows that Airbus continues to hold the advantage in this rivalry.

Of course, Boeing still has a solid backlog for the 737 MAX and continues to receive new orders from several key customers. On the other hand, Boeing will need to significantly increase order volume to support a sustained return to peak production rates. Furthermore, heavy reliance on a few customers has its drawbacks. First of all, large customers tend to accept the biggest discounts, which affects margins.

There is no doubt that Airbus is not going to make life easy for Boeing. The European aircraft manufacturer plans to increase production of the A320neo family to a record high by mid-2023, with a subsequent increase in production through 2025. It will open up additional slots for deliveries, preventing Boeing from getting default orders as a result of Airbus' larger backlog.

The 737 family of aircraft has been a real financial trough for Boeing in the past. The huge global oversupply in the widebody market will make the 737 MAX even more important in the near term. Unfortunately, over the next decade, Boeing will likely have to build the 737 MAX at a slower pace and at lower margins than investors anticipated just several years ago. As a result, Boeing stock will be grounded for some time.