U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Jamieson Greer has raised concerns over a significant government -sponsored loan made to Airbus due to concerns it may provide unfair advantages to the planemaker and threaten a trade truce agreement between the United States and the European Union.
On June 29, the European Investment Bank (EIB), the lending arm of the EU, announced a 3 billion euro (roughly $3.34 billion) loan to Airbus to support research and development in Europe’s aerospace sector. In July, Greer raised concerns about the transaction, warning that Washington would act if the EU was providing unfair loans to Airbus. Despite several inquiries, the USTR “still has no details about this loan,” Greer said in an Oct. 26 statement.
Greer said the current situation “injects substantial uncertainty into transatlantic trade in the aerospace sector.” He said it was important to resolve the situation as soon as possible “to avoid violation of the terms of our hard-won LCA deal.” The 2021 Large Civil Aircraft (LCA) agreement between the United States and the EU had stopped a tariff conflict between the two sides over government financial support in aerospace.
Prior to the deal, the two sides had been in conflict over government funding—involving Boeing for the United States and Airbus for the EU. The United States has argued that Airbus benefited from government-backed loans and other financial support from France, Germany, Spain, and the UK. Meanwhile, the EU alleged that Boeing received tax incentives from various U.S. states and also unfair subsidies through research contracts from the Pentagon and NASA.
Both sides then imposed tariffs on each other’s imports, in line with the World Trade Organization’s (WTO’s) authorizations from 2019 and 2020.
In 2021, the United States and the EU reached an agreement on LCA sales and tariffs. Specifically, in March 2021, the two regions suspended retaliatory tariffs for a period of four months. In July 2021, the European Commission adopted a measure to extend the suspension for five years. And in July this year, the commission extended the suspension once again, citing the United States’ decision not to reimpose countermeasures.
A key question for the USTR would be whether the terms of EIB’s loan to Airbus could be considered a subsidy.
An Airbus spokesman said the EIB loan “is a standard corporate financing facility, similar to commercially-available loans we’ve signed in the past.”
“We are actively engaging with the relevant authorities and are happy to share more information about the loan with governments,” the spokesman said.
In July, an EIB spokesperson dismissed suggestions that it offered Airbus any unusual support, saying that this was a “normal loan, carrying interest, part of the EIB’s overall financing activity,” and that the institution finances thousands of companies annually.
In his statement, Greer said that “after winning at the WTO and imposing significant U.S. duties on EU imports in response, USTR struck a deal with the EU to pause those duties in exchange for a mutual commitment to provide financing to large civil aircraft (LCA) producers on market terms.”
For decades, France, Germany, and Spain have supported Airbus in a manner that provided it an unfair advantage over American aerospace businesses, Greer said.
“I had sincerely hoped that trade-distorting European subsidies to Airbus were a thing of the past,” he said.
The Epoch Times reached out to EIB for comment but did not receive a response by publication time.
Airbus has delivered more aircraft than Boeing so far this year.
According to the latest data, Airbus made 547 deliveries of commercial aircraft in 2026 through September. In contrast, Boeing data show commercial aircraft deliveries at 475 planes.
In September, Boeing announced an order of up to 150 planes from Turkish Airlines and 11 aircraft for Bangladesh’s Biman Bangladesh Airlines. President Donald Trump said in a Sept. 24 post on Truth Social that it was a “big day” for Boeing and American manufacturing.
“TENS of BILLIONS of Dollars in Sales, and huge U.S. Exports, supporting tens of thousands of American Jobs across our Country,” Trump said. “The Market is recognizing what Boeing and I have known all along: When you build in America, export from America, and support American workers, you make your Company stronger.”
Reuters contributed to this report.
