Boeing reported 371 new commercial aircraft orders in December, up 257 from the 114 orders in November, and ending 2023 with gross new orders of 1,456 units, and net of cancellation of 1,314 units. The year total for gross new orders is the highest since 1,550 in 2014. For net new orders this is the highest since 1,432 in 2014.
In December, 168 new orders were from foreign buyers and 203 were from unidentified. There were no domestic orders. The jump in December likely represents some deals begun in November at the Dubai Airshow (November 12-16), but not closed until December. It is typical for December to see a spike in orders as Boeing works to book these before year-end. As such, it probably will not have an oversized impact on the transportation component in the advance report on durable goods orders for December when it is released at 8:30 ET on Thursday, January 25.
December’s total orders include 301 for Boeing’s 737 MAX which has just suffered another public relations disaster with reports of loose bolts in the aircraft’s plug doors. While not on the scale of the fatal disasters and mass cancelations of late 2018 and early 2019, the latest fiasco and grounding of large numbers of aircraft will not help the company’s reputation. Another round of order cancellations in 2024 would be no surprise.
