(Reuters) - A top Boeing Co executive on Thursday showed no concern that rival Airbus could receive U.S. Export-Import Bank financing for its U.S-manufactured jetliners if it met qualifications.
Boeing President and Chief Operating Officer Dennis Muilenburg rebutted the European planemaker's view that U.S. export finance is more favorable than what European credit agencies offer.
The Ex-Im Bank "is something that's for all industry," he said at the Reuters Aerospace and Defense Summit.
The Ex-Im Bank provides loans or loan guarantees for any export largely manufactured in the United States, worth up to 85 percent of its value. On Wednesday, Ex-Im Bank Chairman Fred Hochberg told Reuters that the bank would support foreign sales of U.S.-manufactured Airbus jets if they qualified with sufficient domestic content.
Muilenburg said on Thursday that Boeing fully supports the domestic content rules. "We live by them, and we are more than willing to compete on a fair and level playing field."
Airbus is building a production complex in Mobile, Alabama, that is due to begin delivering planes in 2016.
The jets are not intended for foreign sale, so Airbus doesn't plan to seek U.S. Ex-Im Bank support, Airbus Americas President and Chief Executive Officer Barry Eccleston told Reuters.
"Although we welcome what Chairman Hochberg said, and it kind of confirms what we had assumed, we're not expecting in practice (to receive Ex-Im financing,)" Eccleston said.
Congress is debating whether to reauthorize the U.S. Ex-Im Bank's charter. Boeing and others argue that the U.S. institution is crucial to their ability to compete with other nations that back their exporters. Delta Air Lines and others have argued that U.S. Ex-Im Bank financing should not be offered to wealthy foreign carriers, since it places U.S. airlines at a competitive disadvantage.
Eccleston also said the U.S. Ex-Im Bank more actively supports Boeing than European export credit agencies support Airbus.
"We are very happy with what (European credit agencies) do for us, (but) we find that Ex-Im generally is more creative with the terms and conditions that they offer," he said.
But Boeing's Muilenburg said international export lending rules ensure that the credit is essentially the same in various countries.
Many companies can currently find market-rate financing that is cheaper than export-credit loans or loan guarantees. But even so, failure by Congress to reauthorize the U.S. Ex-Im Bank would put U.S. exporters at a disadvantage by removing that financing as a last resort if markets worsen, Muilenburg said.
"If we have a customer who's evaluating options from both companies, and he can have the confidence of backstop financing from one and not the other - which is what would occur if Ex-Im is not reauthorized - then that unbalances the competition," Muilenburg said.