Avolon has cancelled an additional 27 Boeing 737 MAX aircraft that it was due to receive between now and 2022, on top of the 75 orders the Irish lessor cancelled in Q1.
The news came in a trading update by the Dublin- headquartered firm where it also revealed that it had ended a commitment to acquire an Airbus A330neo, while deferring the delivery of an additional three aircraft of this type from 2020/21 to 2022.
The second quarter also saw the firm deliver three new aircraft and transitioned to follow-on lessees, while selling ten aircraft, five to the Sapphire 2020-1 SPV.
Avolon’s total fleet at the end of Q2 stood at 547 aircraft with orders and commitments for 277 new technology aircraft and book of 145 airline customers in 62 countries.
Dómhnal Slattery, Avolon’s chief executive said, “Q2 was a challenging period for the aviation sector as COVID-19 impacted the industry on an unprecedented global scale, bringing with it continued uncertainty around the pace and timing of a recovery. The months ahead will be difficult, but we have the experience and balance sheet to manage through these headwinds.
In Q2 we continued to reinforce our strong capital position and have maintained over US$5 billion of total liquidity through the first half of this year.
Decisive measures to strengthen our capital position included the opportunistic buy back of US$639 million of our unsecured bonds at a discount to par, in so doing reducing our near-term debt maturities. More significantly, we have reduced our near-term commitments by over 140 aircraft since the start of the year.
These actions provide us with the capital strength to manage through this market backdrop and to support our customers through the recovery.”