Boeing booked no orders last month but received more cancellations: three Max orders were cancelled in September and it dropped orders for 48 more 737Max aircraft. Boeing has so far received 67 orders in 2020 against 448 cancellations for the Max.
On top of this, Boeing removed 602 orders from its books due to uncertainty over completion, due to the financial woes of airline customers. Boeing delivered 11 aircraft in September 2020 compared to 25 in September 2019. Most deliveries continue to be 787s. Overall Boeing has delivered 98 aircraft in 2020 thus far from 301 for the same period in 2019.
As yet, Boeing has not had to lean on the US government for aid but has instead cut costs and raised capital of its own accord. This is against a backdrop where the US Transportation Security Administration said that airport passenger has hit a six-month high, with more than 984,000 people passing through US checkpoints on October 12, from the low of 87,000 on April 14 2020. However, a year ago 2.5 million travellers passed through those same checkpoints.
Boeing is still ticking over during this period of uncertainty however the removal of some 602 aircraft from its order books and the further 448 cancellations for the 737Max show the real picture out there right now. Sorting out the delivery slots for Boeing MAX aircraft must be one of the most thankless tasks in the industry right now. On one hand, there is no real idea of when aircraft can deliver to certain countries; and on the other hand customers just don’t know when they can take delivery, or if they can at all. On top of all this Boeing has the renewed WTO row with the EU to content with.