Category: Program

On 1 February 2025, the Trump administration announced three Executive Orders that will significantly affect tariffs on imports from Canada, Mexico, and China. The modifications regarding tariffs on goods from China and Hong Kong took effect on 4 February while those related to Canadian and Mexican imports are set to be paused until March 2025. Although similar measures were first introduced in 2018 during Trump’s first term as President, the 2025 tariffs are anticipated to exert a more substantial impact on the air cargo sector due to their broader scope.

With these stringent tariffs in place, what are the implications for the aviation market, particularly in the air cargo sector and freighters?

When the initial tariffs on steel and aluminium imports were implemented in March 2018, followed by several rounds of tariffs on Chinese goods, air cargo demand began to slow. While full-year air cargo demand growth in 2018 remained positive at 3.5%, it was significantly lower than the 9.0% and 9.8% seen in 2017 and 2016, respectively. In 2019, air cargo demand subsequently declined by 3.9%.

The new tariffs introduced in 2025 include a “de minimis” provision, which applies to packages valued under $800. This provision, previously exempted in 2018, has been extensively utilised by online retail giants from China, such as Shein and Temu, enabling them to offer goods at remarkably low prices and contributing to their growing popularity. In 2023, approximately 30% of U.S. online shoppers reported purchasing items from China. While specific data on the percentage of total imports falling under the de minimis threshold is not readily available, it is estimated that a significant portion of low value e-commerce shipments will be affected by these new tariffs.

The Trend of Global Air Cargo Supply and Demand

Note: CTK: cargo-tonne-kilometre ACTK: available-tonne-kilometre
Source: IATA; Cirium Ascend Consultancy analysis

Despite the decline in air cargo demand in 2019, the global freighter fleet experienced growth. According to Cirium data, the number of widebody and narrowbody freighters in service increased by 4% and 5% respectively in 2019, while their average daily utilisation rose by 2% and 5%. This suggests that the tariffs imposed in 2018 did not significantly hinder freighter operations. In fact, the rising demand for domestic consumption in both China and the U.S. may have positively influenced narrowbody freighters. This trend is evidenced by global capacity (available cargo ton kilometres), which recorded consistent year-on-year monthly increases throughout 2019, culminating in a moderate 2.1% rise for the full year.

However, the combination of declining demand and increasing supply resulted in a 2.6% decrease in load factor, negatively impacting the profitability of freighter operators, particularly in less efficient international operations. The data indicates that the tariffs enacted in 2018 introduced some challenges, underscoring the complex dynamics of the global trade environment, but there were not insurmountable.

The Fleet of Narrowbody and Widebody Freighters

Source: Cirium Core

The effectiveness of the new tariffs in significantly reducing the US deficit and improving economic conditions remains uncertain. However, one certainty is that air cargo demand may be expected to decline. The extent of this decline will depend on the scope and coverage of the tariffs. Despite the potential short-term turbulence in specific markets, such as China and the US, demand for freighters seems unlikely to be significantly affected. Air cargo demand is projected to continue growing in the long term. However, small widebody freighter operators with a focus on the China-US market may face challenges if the tariffs are prolonged. These operators, with their smaller fleet sizes, might struggle financially under extended tariff implementations.

Many questions remain as a consequence of early policy initiatives from the new US administration, but it is clear that the aviation market will need to closely monitor developments and adapt accordingly to maintain efficiency and competitiveness in a rapidly evolving geo-political environment.

As 2025 opened, the team at Cirium Ascend Consultancy brought together its collective intelligence and insight to estimate how many commercial passenger jets Airbus and Boeing would deliver to customers in 2025 and beyond. Based upon our Cirium Fleet Forecast, plus many years of collective experience, we concluded that Airbus could ship as many as 900 units whilst Boeing might show a strong recovery this year to deliver around 550 passenger aircraft amongst an overall total of 610 commercial jets.

Projecting annual deliveries has become increasingly difficult over the past few years, driven initially by the demand uncertainty induced in the early days of the pandemic but then exacerbated more recently by supply-side uncertainty arising from supply-chain delays and other disruptions at the airframe OEMs. Prime amongst those supply-chain delays have been the engine OEMs. Most specifically, issues within the new-generation CFM Leap and Pratt & Whitney PW1000G programmes have reportedly paced single-aisle deliveries (along of course with Boeing’s own self-induced 737 Max challenges) have caused fewer than expected deliveries from both OEMs.

As a consequence, Airbus delivered 674 single-aisle aircraft last year (599 A320 family and 75 A220s) and Boeing managed only 258. Within our projection of 2025 deliveries, we include an expectation of around 680 A320 family, 100 A220 and 450 737 Max. If these forecasts are to be achieved, and by the way our projections require Airbus to improve 2025 output by around 20% over 2024 and Boeing to increase by 80%, the respective supply chains become pivotal. Both GE and RTX (P&W) have made forward-looking statements in the past 10 days, so we can potentially use those to work out if our projections are credible.

GE noted that it delivered 1,407 Leap engines and expects to increase production by between 15% and 20% in 2025. RTX itself was silent on the number of engines produced but did say it expected to increase large commercial engine output by around 14% whilst at the same time seeing a “modest tilt towards more installs”, indicating airframe OEMs may expect to see slightly more of the 2025 output than they did in 2024. What do these numbers mean?

If GE achieves the mid-point of its planned increase, that would imply around 1,650 engine deliveries in 2025. If we assume that around 20% of these are spare engines, higher than our typical spares assumption but maybe consistent with market demand given Leap is just now starting to see higher volume of first shop visit, then that would yield around 690 shipsets for airframe OEM installation.

At P&W it is a little harder, but we saw around 350 Airbus aircraft deliveries with PW1000G engines in 2024, equating to 700 installed engines. If we assume spares were around 20%, then that implies 840 total engine deliveries last year. Increase by 14% takes us to around 960. Then assume 15% spares this year and we have around 830 engines or 415 installed shipsets.

The overall total of 1,105 engine shipsets is low when compared to the 1,230 deliveries projected above. Of course, Boeing started 2025 with more than 100 737 Max in inventory, including 34 which have already been delivered this year and another 52 737-8/9 variants which almost certainly will be. Those bring the 1,105 total to 1,190, but that is still some 40 aircraft lower than our demand-driven projections. Max volumes could increase further if the 737-7 is certificated this year, with 27 of those in inventory. But that remains highly uncertain for now.

In summary, most recent outlook statements by engine OEMs do suggest that our 2025 delivery projections have downside risk. Last year, we opened with an expectation of more than 1,500 deliveries between Airbus and Boeing, a projection that was iteratively reduced through the year until we arrived at the final much lower totals. It does seem that we may see a similar experience this year, albeit the shortfall looks potentially much smaller given the numbers above.

Finally and with all this in mind, how does January look? I am writing this on the final day of the month and as we stand today (and recognising data lag), initial experience doesn’t look promising. Cirium’s fleet researchers have to date captured details of only two A220, 15 A320 family and 38 737 Max deliveries in January 2025. The first month of the year always features low delivery volumes. Airbus’s January A320 output has ranged between 15 and 32 on an annual basis since 2018, but last year it shipped 26 aircraft so 2025 looks to be lagging that. Boeing typically does a bit better in January and, as already noted, this month’s total to date of 38 does include a vast majority of aircraft which flew for the first time last year or earlier.

Hence, January doesn’t tell us too much other than it is going to be another challenging year both for OEMs and for those of us who love to make short-term forecasts.

Read Part One and Part Two of Do airline dreams come true?

In the previous Cirium Ascend Consultancy Team Perspective, I looked at some examples of airline order backlogs, and how they can easily change over time, see deferrals, or even disappear altogether. This week, I look at the opposite viewpoint. In other words, which airlines are likely to place additional orders in the near future? Have these carriers played it clever, exhibiting sound fleet management, or have they missed the boat in terms of securing fuel-efficient next generation replacements?

Again, all fleet figures refer to single-aisle and twin-aisle passenger aircraft, both in service and stored, operated by airlines.

Current Order Status

The concept of being ‘underordered’ is not that simple. Backlog-to-fleet ratio is a good measure, and if this is above 1.0, clearly the airline is either planning to grow rapidly, or it plans to replace all its current fleet. If the ratio is 0.4 or 0.5, this could well be sufficient for medium-term planning. Variables include market growth rate, the age distribution of the current fleet, as well as the competitive position of the airline. It is necessary to consider the airline group, rather than individual operators or brands, to get the full picture.

The chart below includes airlines or airline groups that have at least 100 aircraft in service today, and have backlog-to-fleet ratios below 0.4. The average age of the current fleet varies widely, between 8-16 years.

Chart 1: Largest ‘underordered’ airlines

Source: Cirium Schedules data, Cirium Ascend Consultancy analysis

Eight of the 22 airlines shown are major network carriers in North America and Europe. They are in slow-growing mature markets, generally own rather than lease their fleets, and also tend to keep aircraft until final removal from service and retirement. Within these, all but Alaska Airlines have average fleet ages above 12 years. Delta and American have the oldest fleets, at 15.5 and 13.8 years respectively. Even allowing for slower growth and older retirement policy, clearly some of these, particularly Air France/KLM Group and IAG, could readily use additional new-generation aircraft. These would cut fuel costs and help airlines reduce their emissions in-line with commitments to Net Zero.

ANA is in a similar situation, with just 59 aircraft on order, and a backlog-to-fleet ratio of just 0.24. However, it does have a younger fleet age profile.

Ryanair has comparatively few aircraft on backlog. After taking delivery of its remaining 38 737 Max 8-200s, it has a backlog of 150 Max 10s. However, in its investor update, it does state it has 300 Max 10 aircraft on order, implying its Letter of Intent (LoI) for another 150 units is almost certainly to be converted to a firm order soon.

Several airlines in Latin America have smaller backlogs at present. However, many in the region have gone through restructuring process, and are traditionally reliant on leasing, so it may be expected some of their shortfall in orders will be met from lessor backlogs.

What About China?

The lack of backlog for Chinese airlines is very apparent. This is a market that grew at 13.3% per annum between 2009 and 2019, and took delivery of 2,900 jets in the decade. Fleets Analyzer data shows just 550 Airbus and Boeing aircraft on order for Chinese airlines today, plus another 475 C919s. Even including the COMAC aircraft, this gives a backlog-to-fleet of just 0.25.

However, there are 1,100 Airbus and Boeing aircraft recorded as being on order for ‘unannounced commercial customers’. Several hundred of these are likely to be for Chinese airlines and leasing companies. The actual destination of these often only becomes apparent at delivery. At this point Boeing unveils ‘unidentified customers identified at delivery’. For example, in its December 2024 data Boeing listed three aircraft delivered to Chinese airlines that were ordered in 2014 and 2016, having lain as unannounced customers for a decade!

In summary, the real backlog for Chinese airlines is higher than 1,025 units, but even so, the country’s airlines will require more aircraft. The obvious conclusion is that they will rely on COMAC to fill the gap, in order to obtain the 400 new aircraft per annum that are called for in the latest Cirium Fleet Forecast.

Lessor Backlog

Chinese operating lessors currently have 495 C919s on order that are not allocated to a specific airline. This highlights an alternative source of new aircraft for airlines that are late to the current order cycle. There are just over 1,400 Airbus and Boeing aircraft on order with lessors with unknown lessees. Obviously some of these will already have been placed with airlines, but they have not been made public yet. Thus it is possible that some of the airlines highlighted as being ‘underordered’ may already have sourced some additional aircraft from the lessor backlog.

For any of the airlines with low backlog-to-fleet ratios that are looking to acquire new aircraft via lessors, they will still have to get in line for a delivery slot. The A320neo and 737 Max families are now sold-out for several years, but even unplaced lessor slots are limited in the next two years as shown in the slide.

Chart 2: Unplaced operating lessor backlog

Source: Cirium Fleets Analyzer, Cirium Ascend Consultancy analysis

Conclusions

Earlier, we highlighted how some airlines have placed huge orders that don’t always come to 100% fruition, for multiple reasons. However, there are currently several large airlines or airline groups that could be considered to be underordered, especially considering the long lead-times required from an order placed in 2025 to delivery.

The first available OEM slots for 737 Max and A320neo family types, as well as twin-aisle 787s and A350s, are now likely to be in the early 2030s, so airlines may have to consider alternative sources of supply. One is via lessors, but how many of their 1,400 unplaced aircraft are really available? There is some earlier OEM availability on the A220 and A330neo, so we may see more interest in these types. It also seems clear that China will look towards the C919 programme to help fill its lack of backlog for Airbus and Boeing single-aisles.

History teaches us that opportunities sometimes arise to reallocate aircraft from airlines that have ordered too many aircraft, or those that find themselves in financial problems. Price escalation is also an issue for some orders placed many years ago, such that an airline may seek to renegotiate its order backlog.

However, deals such as these cannot be done without the full agreement of the aircraft manufacturers themselves, as they retain ownership of the delivery slots. Boeing has recently undertaken a major exercise to find homes for 737 Max aircraft that were originally destined for China. Many have been delivered to India, helping that fast-growing market obtain earlier capacity. In the past, well-capitalised airlines in the US and Europe have obtained slots that have been deferred by airlines during economic downturns. Might we see nearer-term slots at overordered airlines in Southeast Asia become available, or even backlogs transferred to lessors?

In conclusion, some airlines may wish they had placed orders earlier in the post-Covid recovery cycle, but there are always ways that enable a win-win for both airframer and airline when the latter is seen as a ‘strategic customer’. 

Delivery volume for the mainline commercial aircraft types in 2024 was down over 10% year-on-year, amid production issues that blighted Boeing from early January. A deeper dive into the 2024 numbers in context with recent years highlights how OEM market share was impacted. It is also interesting to scrutinise how the geographical distribution of shipments compared last year, and how engine OEM delivery share has been evolving on the A320 family.

Cirium data shows that a total of 1,094 Airbus and Boeing commercial passenger and freighter aircraft were delivered in 2024 (to airline and financial customers), compared with 1,233 in 2023. At the start of last year, our expectations were that the two OEMs’ combined shipment volume could be up 20% above 2023 (i.e. ~1,500 aircraft). Airbus had originally intended to deliver 800 aircraft but in June reduced its forecast to 770 amid ongoing supply-chain snags. Toulouse ultimately achieved a total of 766 deliveries (761 if non-commercial variants and customers are excluded).

Boeing refrained from providing any delivery guidance throughout 2024 as it grappled first with the repercussions on its production rate of the Alaska 737 Max accident and subsequently the machinists’ strike. In the end, Boeing shipped 333 commercial aircraft, a third less than 2023.  As the chart below shows, Boeing’s share of deliveries versus Airbus plummeted last year to only 30% – its lowest since the 2019-2020 period when Max deliveries were suspended.

Ahead of any OEM guidance for 2025, Cirium is projecting deliveries will reach the 1,500-mark originally expected in 2024. Airbus could see its deliveries rise by up to 15% or more, while Boeing is expected to recover its shipments volume and move back towards a share of around 40%. But much will depend on supply-chain and regulatory progress this year.

Airbus/Boeing Commercial Aircraft Deliveries and Market Share – 2018-2025*

Source: Cirium Core; note: passenger/freighter deliveries to commercial operators/financial institutions; *2025F is Cirium estimate prior to any OEM guidance

From a geographical perspective, airlines across the entire Asia-Pacific region took the largest number of deliveries in 2024 (384 aircraft), although with China split out, Europe is elevated to the top slot with 317 shipments.

The chart below illustrates the total 2024 volumes by region and the share they accounted for of each OEM’s deliveries. European airlines took the largest chunk of Airbus’s deliveries, while North America was the biggest market for Boeing (29% of its shipments).  The revival of 737 Max deliveries to China in 2024 after an almost five-year hiatus ensured Boeing’s volumes to this crucial market made a solid return. The 737 accounted for 47 of the US OEM’s 53 shipments to China last year, with the total representing a fifth of all Boeing’s 2024 deliveries.

Airbus/Boeing 2024 Delivery Volume and Share by Region

Source: Cirium Core; note: passenger/freighter deliveries to airline operators only

Pratt & Whitney has been under intense pressure as it sought to tackle the well-documented GTF issues. CFM has also had to address issues which have impacted production. So it is interesting to assess how the two rivals’ share of the A320 market has been evolving since before Covid when deliveries of the GTF/A320neo were still in their early days.

A320 Family Deliveries by Engine OEM and Market Share – 2018-2024

Source: Cirium Core; note: deliveries to commercial operators/financial institutions

Although A320neo family deliveries increased 5% last year, the number powered by the PW1100G actually reduced slightly, while CFM’s share rose significantly. As shown in the chart, engine OEM delivery share shifted from parity in 2023 to CFM taking a 54% last year. 2023 marked the high-/water mark for P&W’s share of A320 deliveries in recent times.

In overall terms, P&W’s share versus CFM of single-aisle aircraft deliveries rose in 2024 to 37%, from 34% in 2023, as CFM volumes were affected by declining 737 Max shipments and P&W saw more A220 deliveries. P&W also powered an additional 47 commercial deliveries in the regional jet sector last year – the PW1900G-powered E-Jet E2.