*China orders airlines to stop accepting deliveries of Boeing jets, spares
Tariff war disruption has caught up with the duo of Boeing and Airbus plane manufacturers, with attendant impacts on the scheduled rollout of new commercial jets.

The twin giant commercial jet manufacturers this week complained about disruptions in the supply of spares and a further cut in market shares.

For American Boeing, the complaint is not unconnected with the development in China, where the Chinese government has told the country’s domestic airlines to stop accepting deliveries of Boeing jets.

China is also instructing its carriers to stop buying airline parts and other components from U.S. companies, according to Bloomberg.

The aviation giant’s shares fell $2.59, or 1.6 per cent, to $156.74 in morning trading.

The order to stop accepting Boeing jets comes after China boosted its retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods to 125 per cent. That matches the level of tariffs that President Trump has placed on Chinese imports, although those taxes can rise as high as 145 per cent for some products. China’s tariffs would have more than doubled the price of U.S.-made aircraft and parts, making the cost unaffordable, Bloomberg reported.

Boeing is scheduled to ship about 10 737 Max aircraft to Chinese carriers, including China Southern Airlines, Air China and Xiamen Airlines. During the first quarter, Boeing delivered 130 aircraft in all, including more than 100 737 jets, the company said on April 8.

President Donald Trump addressed the report in a Truth Social post on Tuesday, writing that China “just reneged on the big Boeing deal, saying that they will ‘not take possession’ of fully committed aircraft.”

Bloomberg reported that some of the payment and delivery paperwork on some jets ordered by Chinese airlines might have been completed before the trade war expanded earlier this month. In that case, the news service reported that some planes might be able to enter China.

The restriction marks a serious blow for Boeing and other manufacturers trying to navigate the escalating trade war between the world’s two biggest economies.

The group chief executive of the budget airline Ryanair, Michael O’Leary, has said his company could delay taking deliveries of Boeing aircraft if they become more expensive.

He told the Financial Times that Ryanair was due to receive a further 25 aircraft from Boeing from August but would not need the planes until around March or April 2026. “We might delay them and hope that common sense will prevail,” O’Leary said.

Shares in Boeing have been buffeted by worries about the impact of trade tariffs and complaints from some shareholders that the company has underinvested in its engineering.

The company has lost 7 per cent of its market value since the start of the year, and in March, its chief financial officer, Brian West, said tariffs could hit the availability of parts from its suppliers.

On Tuesday, the rival European plane manufacturer Airbus said that it was watching the evolving situation on trade tariffs. Its chief executive, Guillaume Faury, told shareholders the company was having problems receiving components from the American supplier Spirit AeroSystems, which was weighing on producing its A350 and A220 jetliners.

The chaotic introduction of Donald Trump’s tariffs has triggered volatility in the stock market since 2 April. However, there has been a tentative recovery this week after the US president announced he was temporarily suspending planned tariffs on imports of smartphones and laptops.

The S&P 500, the American blue-chip index of stocks, ticked up 0.7 per cent in early trading on Tuesday, but was still down about seven per cent so far this year.

There remains a great deal of uncertainty around possible tariffs on computer chips and pharmaceutical imports, with the Trump administration initiating an investigation into the impact of trade in these areas on American national security. Meanwhile, the chip designer Nvidia has announced it will build up to $500bn (£378bn) worth of artificial intelligence infrastructure in the US over the next four years.

In Asia, Japan’s Nikkei index rose by 0.8 per cent on Tuesday and South Korea’s Kospi by 0.9 per cent, with strong gains for carmakers such as Honda, Suzuki and Hyundai, after Trump signalled there would be help for the industry.