JetNet: Volatility Clouds Current Bizav Industry Mood

Volatility is the best word to describe the current state of the business aviation market, according to Rolland Vincent, president of Rolland Vincent Associates and creator of the JetNet iQ Survey. Speaking at NBAA-BACE on Monday, Vincent explained that while factors such as geopolitical risk and tariffs are driving some discomfort and uncertainty among aircraft buyers, the demand signals are still very strong.

For this year, JetNet forecasts deliveries of approximately 820 business jets, up 8% from last year’s total. If that prognostication bears out, that would make 2025 the first year since pre-pandemic 2019 where deliveries surpassed the 800 plateau, and only the second time since 2009 at the start of the Great Recession.

Despite the trend of rising deliveries, backlogs among the “Big Five” OEMs—Bombardier, Dassault, Embraer, Gulfstream, and Textron Aviation—continue to rise. “We’re seeing very persistent backlogs of over two years of production, which is a really nice place to be,” said Vincent, "but frankly, from an OEM point of view, you want to start turning that backlog into more cash. We could probably easily be doing 1,000 airplanes this year as an industry, and even for a sustained period.”

To further illustrate that demand, Vincent examined the on-market inventory of many popular preowned aircraft models and found most with but a handful available. “We’re in a strong demand market, tight supply,” he noted. “If you’ve got one of these for sale, you are in a very strong pricing position.”

According to Vincent, issues that have restrained the industry over the past several years still persist. “We continue to have, after all these years, supply-chain, supplier, talent experience, and talent pipeline issues,” he stated. “So we have a really nice backlog, well-priced deals of course, if you are the seller, but we’re still not getting over the supply challenge.”

JetNet iQ has been conducting its operator surveys for nearly 15 years, and in every quarter, it asks its respondents “how they would describe the current market conditions for business aviation.” In its just-completed third-quarter survey, nearly 55% indicated that we are past the current low point, while slightly over 30% felt that the market has not yet reached the low point.

That equated to the highest optimism score in the survey since third-quarter 2022, and the largest jump from one quarter to another in survey history. In the second quarter of this year, the survey indicated strong pessimism, driven by the imposition of U.S. tariffs and their contribution to market uncertainty.

The survey found that the restoration of 100% bonus depreciation would at least somewhat positively influence the purchase of a new aircraft in the next year among more than 59% of respondents. However, the uncertainty rising from the tariffs would at least somewhat negatively impact plans for aircraft purchase over the next year for nearly half the respondents.

While the survey focuses on feedback from business aircraft operators, it should be no surprise that they would agree with the statement: “Without business aviation, my/our company or organization would be less successful and less profitable.” Nearly 87% of respondents indicated they would endorse that statement at least somewhat.

Among the new aircraft models attracting the most attention from the respondents in this recently closed survey, Gulfstream and Pilatus each occupied two of the top slots, the former with its G400 and G800, while the latter was represented by its PC-12 turboprop single and PC-24 light jet.

The PC-12 was the top model among preowned aircraft as well, tying with Gulfstream’s G650/G650ER and Cessna Citation Excel/XLS/XLS+.

When asked in the survey what they viewed as the top industry challenges over the next five years, respondents said supply-chain recovery topped the chart, followed by aircraft MRO capacity.

Increased Flight Activity

The 4.5 million global business jet and turboprop flights through September of this year represent a 3.7% increase over last year, with North America accounting for 67% of that activity, according to Christoph Kohler, founder and managing director of JetNet subsidiary WingX. That increase represents part of a larger overall step-change in flight activity since the pandemic. Since 2019, flights have increased by 33%, rendering this summer’s activity the busiest on record.

In the U.S., WingX examined the U.S. cities with the fastest-growing millionaire populations and found that they closely aligned with areas showing the largest increases in private jet activity. The Southeast experienced a rise of more than 46% since 2019, followed by the Southwest at 33%. While weekend leisure activity is growing, the company also found that weekday travel has seen a slight decrease compared to historical data.

Corporate flight department activity has declined, but according to WingX, it has not been eliminated; it has merely migrated to the fractional segment. The company has developed an algorithm that it says can predict flight hour activity by business sector, based on stock market prices.

In Europe, it noted that many factors have combined to mute growth, including the war in Ukraine, economic stagnation, political instability, and environmental activism.