Greer Warns EU That $3.4 Billion Airbus Loan Puts Aircraft Trade Truce at Risk
U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said a $3.4 billion European Investment Bank loan to Airbus puts a transatlantic trade truce at risk, after his office received no details about the loan despite repeated requests.
WASHINGTON – U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer warned the European Union on Monday that a record-breaking loan to Airbus from the European Investment Bank threatens a transatlantic trade truce, including a deal on financing large civil aircraft projects.
Greer said that despite “ongoing requests,” his office has received no details about the $3.4 billion loan made in June from the European Investment Bank, the EU’s official lending arm. “This situation injects substantial uncertainty into transatlantic trade in the aerospace sector,” Greer said. “It is important this situation is resolved as soon as possible to ensure market-driven production in the aerospace sector and to avoid violation of the terms of our hard-won LCA deal.”
U.S. planemaker Boeing had asked the U.S. government in July to press for transparency on the loan, which came amid speculation that Airbus would use the funds to develop a new aircraft model.
A 17-year dispute behind the truce
The United States and the EU fought a 17-year battle over alleged aircraft subsidies at the World Trade Organization, with both sides winning partial victories, before agreeing to a five-year truce in 2021 that forestalled mutual tariffs on some $11.5 billion worth of trade. The truce was extended in July after the EU parliament approved a broader U.S. trade deal that removed tariffs on U.S. industrial goods in return for a 15% U.S. tariff on most EU goods. President Donald Trump had threatened higher tariffs unless EU member states met a July 4 deadline for ratifying the deal initially reached in July 2025.
What each side says about the loan
One question now is whether the terms of the European Investment Bank loan would be considered a subsidy for Airbus, as the World Trade Organization has found in the past on such loans. Airbus and Boeing did not immediately respond on Monday to requests for comment, according to Reuters.
The European Investment Bank said in July that it finances thousands of companies every year and denied offering Airbus any unusual support. “This is a normal loan, carrying interest, part of the EIB’s overall financing activity,” a spokesperson for the lender said. Airbus Chief Financial Officer Thomas Toepfer told reporters in London in July that the loan had been taken out “completely at market level.”
Reporting based on coverage by Reuters.
