Historically, sales activity drops considerably during an election year.

I’m starting to think this year may be different. Q4 was our busiest quarter ever and I don’t see anyone pumping the brakes. We’re currently working with folks that plan to get started after the first, we have acquisitions that are already planned for the summer (when it usually slows way down as people wait on the election) one of our clients just ordered a set of -67A’s for his King Air 300 that will be a mid-summer install (waiting on G1000 being added to STC). All of these folks seem unphased by the coming election.

Please don’t go political and get this thread locked. Surely we can discuss the market that effects us all, as well as the economy we all survive in, without talking about politics... plus the media has exhausted the topic!

We just put our CL604 on the market and the attention on a classic is incredible.... The replacement is much harder to find as prices are very firm...

We do a lot of business in the SMB marketplace and there seems to be a lot of confidence going into 2020. Lots of growth (employees) and expansion (facilities). Wishing you the best in 2020 Chip! Thanks for your contributions to BT.

Peace,
Don

I suspect your suspicions may be right when a president has served two terms or is likely to lose. Normally, the last year of the first term of an incumbent president when the economy is doing satisfactory is good for large purchases and the stock market in general.

Wondering what the salvage market will look like after the first of the year. Seems like a lot of non-ADSB owners are holding out. We have not seen the attrition we were expecting in 2019.

Thanks Don! Same to you Sir!

I would guess that sales dips in election years typically represent business uncertainty.To the extent that jet sales represent confidence in the economy I think things look pretty good. The tax cuts are fully implemented and there doesn't look like there will be any changes (reverses) in the next year or two. The economy's fundamentals look strong in the immediate horizon. Interest rates are forecasted to remain low, and in fact, given the world wide economic situation, can't really go up much if at all in near term.

Sitting on a bank board we're seeing strong loan demand from healthy borrowers. Business plans for companies on the books are generally positive outside of the energy sector. In our insurance business we are seeing continued sales and payroll growth forecasted by business customers.

Politics matters in all of this but I don't see a lot of worry about volatility showing up in economic numbers.

All of that looks like a healthy environment for business people to be buying bigger, faster and more expensive aircraft.

It's an election year, Iran, etc.

I'm talking to a lot of people every day and all I hear is confidence and optimism.

2020 will be a good year. Full steam ahead.

Same here.

CJ2 values certainly took a poop....

Yes, yes they did.

It is rare to see a market recover as much as the CJ2 market did and then see those increases evaporate during the same year.

I have been asked to write an article about King Air values for King Air Magazine... I'm struggling. I saw premium airplanes bring premium prices last year... fair airplanes sell cheap... and we made a couple of buys that qualify as our best deals to date.

The reality is we are talking about micro markets... people ask me about the market for a specific aircraft and I say "I'll have to do the research... because if one sold yesterday it may have just changed the whole market"

My Darn insurance market is going to be a bigger problem than the election, I am sorry to say.

Its harder getting deals done. They don't like high limits, or old planes, or old pilots, or high values, or single pilots, or blah blah blah.

Sorry guys... I think my industry is "part of the problem" for a while.
Not my idea of good service.

It's like our policy holders are all of a sudden viewed as Liabilities when they used to be our Assets. Strange days.

TJ

Hard to postulate about an election year without getting into politics.

To factor out the political climate, sort of renders the question as helpless for lack of analysis no?

Why?