Boeing rises premarket on report China mulling ending freeze with 737 Max deal

Investing.com -- Shares in Boeing (NYSE:BA) rose in premarket U.S. trading on Monday after Bloomberg News reported that China is mulling potentially resuming purchases of the planemaker's fast-selling 737 Max jets.

Beijing is considering committing to the aircraft when Chinese President Xi Jinping and U.S. counterpart Joe Biden meet at a summit in San Francisco later this week, Bloomberg said, citing people familiar with the matter.

However, Xi is not expected to announce a formal order for the 737 Max, the report added. It noted as well that the terms of a possible agreement were still under discussion and could change prior to Xi and Biden's meeting on Wednesday.

China previously stopped deliveries of the 737 Max over four years ago following two deadly crashes, while Chinese carriers have all but shut out Boeing from their new orders since 2017 amid ongoing tensions between Washington and Beijing.

Boeing is attempting to re-establish itself in the country's lucrative air travel market. Its absence in the country has allowed European rival Airbus to scoop up both profits and market share, while state-owned Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China has secured its largest-ever order for its C919 single-aisle passenger plane from China Eastern Airlines).

In September, Boeing slightly improved its annual 20-year outlook for new deliveries to China due in part to increasing demand for domestic travel.