Emirates Places Record Boeing Jets Order

Emirates Airline, the government owned carrier based in Dubai, placed a huge order at the Dubai air show on Sunday for about fifty Boeing (NYSE:BA) 777 jets, emphasizing the confidence overflowing amid Persian Gulf airline carrier market  under rising threats of global growth retardation.

The deal will cost about $18 billion, according to Emirates Airlines. This deal will be the largest commercial order by value in the history of the world’s largest airplane manufacturer. Sheik Ahmed bin Saeed al Maktoum, chairman of Emirates, said at a news conference that Boeings 777 jetliner in terms of seat costs has served Emirates profitably.

Adequate financing is in place for next year and there are no plans to issue fresh bonds, said Emirates. Chairman Sheik Ahmed said Emirates would consider a bond based on the necessity and the timing, adding that Emirates do not have to push. The group had initiated a heavily oversubscribed bond worth about $1 billion, which was issued in June.

Emirates also plans to purchase another 20 more of the twin aisle 777 jetliners and other agreements, the total deal might sum up to $26 billion, Boeing and Emirates said. The delivery of the jets is scheduled to begin in early 2015.

Emirates order will sustain thousand of American Jobs, said James F. Albaugh, chief of commercial airplane division at Boeing. The largest airplane manufacturer in the world has delivered 127 commercial planes in the third quarter that ended Sept 30, including hundred of its best selling 737 narrow body jets and twenty one wide body 777 jets. Boeing has set its commercial airplane delivery guidance at about 480 for 2011, down compared to previously set guidance of 485 to 495.

Sheik Mohammed, Dubai’s King, spent hours at the air show, looking at military and commercial planes and touring the floor ahead of the Emirate Airlines news conference, highlighting the keen interest that Emirates has in the success of its airline carrier business and ambitions to make Dubai a major business and tourism hub. Emirates also enquired about Boeing’s F/A-18 Super Hornet.

Demands for commercial aircrafts has been remarkably healthy, driven by increasing number of middle class passengers in Asia and the Middle East and supported by a shift of economic power form the West, however according to some analysts the threat from European debt crisis persists. Fuel prices also did take a huge toll on Emirates first half profits, sending them down by 76 percent.

Post Written By: Ed Liston Ed Liston is a senior contributing editor at TheStockMarketWatch.com. An active market watcher and investor, Ed guides an independent team of experienced analysts and writes for multiple stock trader publications. He is widely quoted in various financial publications on the Internet. When Ed is not writing about stocks, investing in stocks, talking about stocks, or otherwise doing something stock related, he likes to go sailing and fishing in his yacht.