RE:FOCUS-U.S. private jet buyers - InfoThx, Inuk. Here's the rest of the article:
Research consultancy WINGX said branded charter activity in North America fell 2% last year. WINGX sees 2023 flight activity falling from pandemic levels, but still ahead of 2019.
EMISSIONS BACKLASH
Another factor giving buyers pause is the growing backlash over emissions, with countries like Belgium planning to tax corporate aircraft and the labeling of some U.S. celebrities who own jets as “climate criminals.”
Zipporah Marmor, vice president at business aviation services company ACASS, recalled one deal for a preowned business jet that fell apart following proposals in Europe to ban, tax or regulate private aircraft. The European company’s board discouraged the deal.
Montreal business jet maker Bombardier, which reports earnings on Feb. 9, has said it was able to resell four or five airplanes originally destined for buyers in Russia before the war in Ukraine to other customers.
Aerospace analyst Richard Aboulafia said the key is avoiding a crash in demand as in 2008.
“My issue is if things get 2008-bad, then the backlog is a false sense of security,” he said, adding such a crash is unlikely.
For now, one company’s collapsed deal is another buyer’s good fortune. Marmor turned the failed deal with the European company into a sale to a U.S. buyer two weeks later at a higher price.
“Buyers are willing to be more flexible to get an airplane,” she said. (Reporting by Allison Lampert in Montreal, Editing by Ben Klayman and Matthew Lewis)