Geopolitics leads Boeing to downgrade dozens of jet orders

Boeing says global geopolitical concerns are a big reason why it is dropping more than 100 planes from its backlog of pending orders

Boeing has removed 141 airplanes from its backlog of pending orders, many of them because of what it termed geopolitical considerations including restrictions on sales because of sanctions like those imposed on Russia for its war against Ukraine.

That means that Boeing now questions whether those sales will ever be completed because of sanctions.

Boeing still has more than 4,200 undelivered orders. Under U.S. accounting rules, Boeing regularly adds or removes orders from the backlog, but usually only when an order is canceled or the buyer's financial problems put the deal in jeopardy.

This time, however, the company said Tuesday that about two-thirds of the 130 Boeing 737s that it removed from the backlog resulted from geopolitical reasons including sanctions. The move suggests that 85 to 90 sales were, in effect, downgraded to questionable because of the sanctions.