Publication: Lara
There can hardly have been more of a significant shake-up for the airline industry than the COVID-19 pandemic. And even though the leasing sector usually helps provide stability for carriers, it has not been immune to turmoil. The lessors are therefore eyeing up the market for when a post-pandemic upturn might arrive. Bernie Baldwin reports on the current engine leasing market.
“The engine leasing market continues to remain very soft, especially in the mid-to-end-of-life market where engines currently have green time remaining. However, with a global mass vaccine rollout program now accelerating at pace, we are hopeful that global restrictions on flying will start to ease and demand for global travel will increase.” Said Auvinash Narayen, Head of Acquisitions and Leasing at AerFin.
“This is likely to cause significant lease demand for green time engines. Particularly on the narrow-body and regional platforms as operators attempt to both manage the potential capacity challenges the MROs will experience as they accommodate a surge in shop visit demand, as well as mitigating those high-cost evens.” Narayen notes."
"We have seen an increase in engine exchange activity to support operation/transition on younger vintage narrow-body aircraft as operators and owners seek a more economical solution to meet immediate demand. However, only a limited number of high-quality engines are available to satisfy such demand despite the abundance of green-time engines available on the market. This could create a real challenge for airlines’ fleet planning moving forward, as they seek a constant thrust solution with often restricted budgets and minimal in-house technical resource to manage unscheduled engine downtime events.”
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