Mark Huber is an aviation industry veteran who has worked in the flight training, aircraft sales, aircraft component, and airport development businesses. He has flight time in more than 50 different and diverse aircraft, including helicopters, aerobatic aircraft, vintage warbirds, jet fighters, business jets and turboprops, and transport-category aircraft. He has jumped out of several of these—on purpose—with a parachute. His defense and aviation journalism has been published in a variety of national and international periodicals.

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Mark Huber

The business aviation finance market is set to grow, according to research released this week at NBAA-BACE 2023 by Airbus Corporate Jets. The study surveyed 50 private jet brokers and 50 business aviation financiers.
According to the study, 82 percent of U.S.-based business aviation financiers and private jet brokers expect access to this financing to increase over the next three years and 98 percent believe that jet financing rates remain attractive.&nbsp;But 25 percent believe future deals will require substantially more cash, while 54 percent expect only a slight rise in the cash requirements.
Meanwhile, 74 percent see a preference for fixed, as opposed to floating, interest rates over the next five years for those using leases and credit. Some 69 percent of respondents expect leasing will increase between now and 2028.
A jump in demand for larger business jets over the next five years was seen by 85 percent of respondents, 51 percent believed this would aid in maintaining residual value, and 77 percent believed the increased demand would make financing of larger jets comparatively easier than smaller aircraft. Finally, 68 percent believe that specialist lenders will increase their market share over mainstream banks.
The increased financing is seen as key to the $150 billion business aviation contributes annually to the U.S. economy, a number forecasted to grow to $190 billion in five years by 31 percent of those surveyed and to $180 billion by 69 percent. Fully 72 percent expect business aviation activity to increase in support of the economies of communities without commercial airline service, and 76 percent see an increase in the role of business aviation in supporting emergency and humanitarian relief.
A separate survey of senior executives at large corporations that own private jets indicated that 77 percent of these companies already use their aircraft for humanitarian and charitable purposes and that 87 percent think such utilization will increase over the next three years.
On the environmental front, 93 percent of senior executives surveyed who charter business aircraft said they would focus on chartering newer, more efficient aircraft, 95 percent who own or lease aircraft said they are investing more in technology for route optimization to reduce fuel burn and emissions, and 61 percent believe their company would increase their aviation budget by up to 25 percent to buy sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and/or buy more fuel-efficient aircraft.
Overall, environmental awareness among this surveyed group also appears to be increasing, with 95 percent saying their companies have a good understanding of the carbon footprint of their flights. Notably, nine out of 10 said their carbon footprint understanding has improved over the past five years, with 49 percent saying that understanding has increased dramatically.
The two main reasons cited for this shift include the appointment of specialists to monitor the carbon footprint of these flights and increased investment in these teams, while a third is more detailed carbon data collected on these flights.
In other news at the company, the Airbus ACJ TwoTwenty is making its NBAA-BACE debut at this year’s show. Airbus stressed that the “Xtra Large Bizjet” aircraft derived from the single-aisle A220 airliner is already capable of flying on a blend of 50 percent SAF.

Issues regarding financing of aircraft; aviation insurance; tax issues for aircraft operators; new companies and people in the aviation financing and insurance industries.

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