July 1, 2010

The Economist

The WTO made public its ruling on Boeing’s six-year-old complaint against Airbus. The thrust of the decision was already known and, as expected, the trade body found that Airbus, and particularly its A380 super-jumbo project, benefited from illegal European subsidies. Airbus maintained that 70% of Boeing’s claims had been rejected and that the WTO could not find that European launch aid resulted in a “material injury” to American interests, nor that the subsidies caused losses in jobs and profits in America’s aircraft industry. A preliminary ruling on a counter case brought by Europe against Boeing is expected this month.