The ratings provider placed Boeing's Baa2 senior unsecured rating on review for a downgrade from stable, according to a statement Tuesday.

Moody's Ratings could downgrade its credit rating on Boeing, the planemaker that on Monday unveiled a broad leadership overhaul, due to the financial impact of the company's safety crisis.

The ratings provider placed Boeing's Baa2 senior unsecured rating on review for downgrade from stable, according to a statement Tuesday, citing the possibility that Boeing will not deliver 737 aircraft in the volumes needed to materially expand free cash flow and " withdraw the debt within a reasonable period of time.

Boeing receiving a reduction in its rating translates into a perception of greater risk for those who lend money to the company, that is, higher interest rates or fewer possibilities of obtaining financing.

Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun will step down from his position at the end of the year, the company said in a statement Monday. Stan Deal, the embattled head of Boeing's commercial aircraft division, is leaving immediately and will be replaced by Chief Operating Officer Stephanie Pope.

BOEING'S BAD TIME

Boeing Chief Executive Dave Calhoun will step down at the end of the year, part of a broad leadership overhaul at the company as the planemaker struggles to control a growing safety crisis.

Chairman Larry Kellner will not run for re-election, Boeing said in a statement. Stan Deal, the embattled head of Boeing's commercial aircraft division, will also leave immediately and will be replaced by Chief Operating Officer Stephanie Pope.

The restructuring reflects growing customer frustration as the crisis centered on manufacturing quality and aircraft safety shows no signs of abating. Kellner, Calhoun and Deal mark the highest-profile departures since a near-catastrophic incident involving its 737 Max airliner plunged Boeing into deepening turmoil.

Calhoun and Deal faced mounting criticism from disgruntled customers after the Alaska Airlines incident in January exposed flaws in Boeing's manufacturing controls.

Pressure had increased to renew top management. Doubts about his leadership reached a peak last week, when the heads of major airlines asked the board of directors to meet directly, without Calhoun present.

The decision to bypass the CEO offered a signal to investors and company officials alike: Airlines were losing patience with top brass.

The leadership change was finalized during a board session over the weekend, according to people familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified.

The changes had been discussed for months amid the growing crisis, the sources said, but the matter came to a head over the need to issue the annual proxy statement, at which point it is late compared to what is typical for Boeing.

Kellner in particular wanted to make sure the handover of the chairman and CEO roles was planned before the company's annual meeting, one of the sources said.

“While the loss of a job is rarely something to celebrate, we think it is probably a smart decision by Boeing's board of directors,” Robert Stallard, an analyst at Vertical Research Partners, told clients.

“It can be said that many of Boeing's customers, suppliers and other stakeholders have lost faith in the company, while its relationships with the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) and the NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board) They are clearly tense.”

A detailed audit of Boeing and its suppliers by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration raised concerns about the company's safety culture, the agency's top official said last week.

Former Qualcomm chief Steve Mollenkopf, who has been on Boeing's board since 2020, will lead the search for a new CEO as a lead independent director, the company said.

Potential candidates for the top job include Pope, who remains in the race despite changing roles in this reshuffle, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Others under consideration would be General Electric CEO Lawrence Culp; David Gitlin, chairman of Boeing and CEO of Carrier Global Corp; Patrick Shanahan, CEO of Boeing Spirit supplier AeroSystems Holdings, and Greg Smith, president of American Airlines Group and former Boeing CFO.

Representatives for Gitlin, Shanahan and Smith did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

In an interview in February, when asked if he would be interested in becoming CEO of Boeing, Culp said he was “looking forward to serving Boeing as its most important partner and supplier.”

Whoever is chosen will take over a company that “has been playing reactionary defense for quite some time,” said Bank of America analyst Ron Epstein.

“This may be the first real opportunity, in a long time, that Boeing has had to clean up and reset its own narrative.”

MULTIPLE CRISIS

Calhoun, a longtime Boeing chief and formerly of General Electric and Blackstone Group LP, took the top job in early 2020 as the planemaker recovered from the global grounding of the 737 Max following two crashes.

He is ending a four-year stint as CEO, dealing with the fallout from another near-catastrophe with the same model.

“I have been considering for some time, in conversations with our board of directors, the appropriate timing for a CEO transition at Boeing,” Calhoun said in a message to employees.

“The eyes of the world are on us and I know we will emerge from this moment a better company, building on all the learnings we accumulated as we worked together to rebuild Boeing over the past few years.”

The latest 737 Max debacle has further strained Boeing's finances, limiting its ability to boost the production it was counting on to achieve its pre-crisis goal of generating $10 billion in cash by 2025 or 2026. The chief financial officer Boeing CEO Brian West warned last week that the company expects a massive cash outflow this quarter, an outflow of at least $4 billion.

Under Calhoun, Boeing returned the 737 Max to commercial service in 2020 after a long global grounding following two fatal crashes in 2018 and 2019. But the planemaker has struggled to increase production levels in the wake of the pandemic as it struggled with worker rotation and with a series of quality failures within its factories and suppliers.

Boeing faces a renewal of its management team and board of directors as it works to restore quality controls and regain the trust of customers, employees, regulators and the flying public. Calhoun, 66, had laid out his succession plan late last year by elevating Pope to the role of chief operating officer, signaling an eventual end to his career as chief executive.

Kellner, the former chief executive of Continental Airlines, was considering resigning after 13 years as a Boeing chief and four years as president.

THE REACTIONS

The head of Ryanair Holdings welcomed Monday's measures in a statement, calling them "very necessary." Other major airline customers were more cautious in their reactions, with Delta Air Lines, United Airlines Holdings and Southwest Airlines pledging to work with the new team.

SPEEA, the union representing more than 19,000 Boeing and Spirit workers, issued a scathing statement calling Boeing's problems in the executive ranks systemic. CEO Ray Goforth said “nothing is going to change for the better without company leaders acknowledging their flaws and fully committing to fixing them.”

TD Cowen analyst Cai von Rumohr described the overhaul as a “partial step” toward changing the company's culture and rebuilding investor confidence. He suggested that directors also review whether Boeing should move its headquarters to Seattle and give its largest union a seat on the board.

The latest changes are “a good first step in addressing the company's myriad problems,” Stallard said. “The main missing piece of the puzzle is who will be the next CEO. “It will take someone with pedigree and patience, as fixing Boeing will likely be a multi-year, non-linear journey.”