General Electric (GE) is currently having a very good week with investors seeing many positives, however even with a good week that does not mean that all is well at one of Wall Street’s largest industrial show stories. Recent comments from a GE spokesperson has explained that the companies aviation division has amassed bookings of over $50 Billion USD in orders for their engines over the course of two days at the Paris Air show this week. Included in the orders are two large engine deals, one with Indigo Airlines for $20 Billion, and one with Air Asia for $23 Billion. GE said that at the 2017 Paris Air show they only got $31 Billion in orders, so this year has been a great step up for the company.
This great news, and improved stats are arguably a mere appetizer for investors in GE, however GE has confirmed that their Aviation Services division have landed themselves a huge deal with Amazon to lease 15 units of 737-800 Boeing cargo aircrafts, as the online retail giant are expanding and pushing further into controlling their own supply chain, which will enable them to further increase their profits. Dave Clark the Senior Vice president of operations globally at Amazon said in a recent statement to investors “These new aircrafts create additional capacity for Amazon Air, building on the investment in our Prime Free One-Day program,by 2021, Amazon Air will have a portfolio of 70 aircrafts flying in our dedicated air network.”
Richard Greener Senior VP at GECAS Cargo shared in the delight of Amazons new move, he said “We’re delighted to support Amazon Air’s dedicated air network,the capability of the 737-800 freighter will further Amazon’s ability to provide reliable and regional delivery to its customers for years to come.” Shares of GE surged almost 5% on Tuesdays trading based on the fantastic news. It’s fantastic to see GE making the safe move to partner their aviation business with a growing and successful company like the giant that is Amazon. With GE’s second quarter earnings call approaching, CEO Larry Culp will be more than happy to be able to share this news with investors and potential investors. More good news for GE this week came as John Inch at Gordon hatchet has recently changed his view, saying that GE will not have a risk to insolvency from another round of rating downgrades that we saw in 2018. John Inch said “It’s highly unlikely that would happen, GE has privately said the credit ratings agencies are happy and comfortable with their liquidity plans for the next 18 months. I think that has bought them a lot of breathing room and time.”
However Inch still remains bearish on GE and still has an underperform rating on it, and couples this with a $7 dollar price target. The reason behind Inch’s bearish sentiment is he does not believe that a turnaround will happen as quickly as many others do.
Graham White – IEC International