The UK Serious Fraud Office's formal investigation into Airbus, disclosed on 8 August and centred on "irregularities" in regard to third-party consultants, is potentially immaterial unless it snowballs into guilty verdicts and scandal.
But what is important is that European export credit agencies are unlikely to be guaranteeing any aircraft deals for the Toulouse-based manufacturer until the investigation concludes or cools down.
This leaves the manufacturer exposed to future financial headwinds until the ECAs are satisfied by the SFO findings to the point that they start offering guarantees on its products again.
Airbus executives need only ask their counterparts at Rolls-Royce about how long the SFO can take to investigate a company.
The UK engine manufacturer has been under formal investigation since December 2013, and the SFO's website indicates that the probe is still ongoing.
If Airbus faces a similar timeframe, the SFO will still be dialing the Toulouse and Hamburg area codes in 2019 and perhaps beyond.
An inability to offer ECA-backed deals for its products could leave Airbus exposed if market conditions become less benign.
For now, aircraft financing is abundant, so being cut off from ECA support is a relatively minor inconvenience.
"The depth and breadth of commercial market liquidity should continue the trend of historically low usage of export credit," Boeing noted in its 2016 Current Aircraft Finance Market Outlook.
Last year, ECA-backed deals only applied to 6% of Airbus's deliveries.
However, a mere half-decade ago – post global financial crisis and in the midst of the eurozone crisis – ECA-backed deals accounted for 30% of new aircraft deals.
It is in times of crisis that ECA-backed debt really comes to the fore, offering lenders the comfort they need to offer financing when markets are uncertain. And this allows companies like Airbus to continue to sell big-ticket items such as aircraft.
If Airbus is not able to offer ECA guarantees on its aircraft when the next downturn hits, then for a large slice of sales the customers' ability to raise financing will be at question. One can only guess at how much this could impact Airbus financially.
Crucially, though, rival Boeing is likely to have its ECA, the US Export-Import Bank, available again when the next downturn occurs. Ex-Im is not able to guarantee loans above $10 million at the moment, but only as result of bureaucratic issues that should be resolved once the presidential election ends.
Airbus's ECA situation looks far more uncertain.
In its first half results for 2016, the European manufacturer indicated that it expected ECA financing to resume in the fourth quarter. That looks like wishful thinking now.
Source: Cirium Dashboard
