Both Airbus and Boeing are due to release their financial results for the first half (H1) of 2019 in the upcoming weeks. Ahead of that, numbers of planes delivered and orders gained are already known.
In the second quarter (April-June) of 2019, Airbus has delivered 227 aircraft, bringing the year’s total to 389 deliveries. In Q2, most of the delivered aircraft were A320neo, A321neo and Airbus’ “rising star” A350-900.
In 2019 so far, Airbus has landed 213 passenger aircraft orders. However, the Toulouse-based manufacturer’s backlog actually rose just by 88 planes, as it saw cancellations of 125 aircraft. Of the deals made, most orders revolved around A320neos. Both Saudia and an undisclosed customer placed orders for 30 and 23 planes accordingly during the Paris Air Show.
The second in line to the “most popular Airbus type” throne stands A321neo. While no one ordered it in the first three months of the year, the demand for the type flourished in June, with Qantas, American Airlines (A1G) (AAL) and an undisclosed customer placing orders for 10, 20 and 13 aircraft (accordingly) during the airshow.
As for Boeing, the U.S. manufacturer has delivered 90 commercial passenger planes in the second quarter of 2019, bringing this years’ total to 239 aircraft. While the 737 remains the most delivered aircraft this year to date, in the second quarter there were only 24 deliveries of the type, versus 42 Dreamliners that now dominate the chart.
The second quarter was particularly slow for the plane maker in terms of new business gained ‒ orders. Boeing scored only 13 new orders, eight of them for freighter aircraft, according to its orderbook (as of June 30, 2019).
Nevertheless, keeping in mind that the second quarter started just after the world-wide MAX grounding came into force in mid-March 2019, it might come as a surprise that four out of five passenger aircraft ordered during this period is of the type. An unidentified customer placed an order for 4 737 MAX jets on April 26, 2019.
In total, Boeing’s backlog has shrunk by 119 net orders in 2019 so far (as of June 30, 2019). The positive impact of 767, 777 and 787 sales was knocked down by the ongoing MAX crisis, due to which, the manufacturer has lost at least* 71 MAX net orders. Boeing 737 MAX backlog remains at 4547 aircraft unfilled orders.
*While in total Boeing scrapped off 180 737 orders (presumably, of both NG and MAX versions) the majority of it was attributed to “ASC 606 changes”.