Boeing Reveals Just How Bad a Year it Had
It’s basic Newtonian physics, as Boeing just learned: When the sky falls for a company, so, too, will the bottom line.

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It’s basic Newtonian physics, as Boeing just learned: When the sky falls for a company, so, too, will the bottom line.
On Monday, the extremely troubled aerospace giant announced its total delivery figures for 2024, which fell about 33% year-over-year, thanks to the company’s polycrisis of terrifying mid-air malfunctions and a protracted labor strike. Unsurprisingly, rival Airbus filled the void. And then some.
Entering a Freefall
Boeing’s terrible, horrible, very bad, no good year needs no recap (though here’s one anyway, just in case). But now the fallout is clear. Last year, Boeing delivered just 348 aircraft, its lowest figure since the pandemic and down from 528 in 2023. Way back in 2018, the manufacturer delivered a record 806 planes. Back in October, Boeing had reported losses of around $8 billion through the first nine months of 2024 — a number likely to balloon when Boeing reports fourth-quarter and full-year results in a couple weeks.
That’s all pretty bad. Worse? Airbus wasted no time swooping into the open market space:
- Last year, Boeing’s European competitor, which announced its 2024 figures last week, delivered 766 aircraft — the most since 2019. Airbus also said it logged 878 gross orders and 826 net orders last year, besting Boeing’s 569 gross and 377 net orders, respectively.
- Still, both firms face headwinds moving forward due to ongoing supply chain constraints, which factored heavily in Boeing’s bad year along with its near-disasters and labor stoppage.
On the Horizon: So will things ever get better for Boeing? At the Airline Economics conference in Dublin on Monday, Boeing’s vice president for commercial marketing Darren Hurst projected “about a five-year impact in terms of what we need to do” to return balance to supply and market demand. Translation: Boeing’s gonna be in it for the long, long haul.