There’s More Than Meets the Eye with Large Corporate Ex-Im Bank Users

Behind every large corporate user of the U.S. Export-Import (Ex-Im) Bank—a guarantor of affordable export financing—are hundreds, even thousands, of small business suppliers whose futures are inextricably connected to the bank’s fate.

Click Bond, Inc., in Carson City, Nevada and Watertown, Connecticut, is a case in point. The company is a developer and manufacturer of fastening hardware and adhesive bonding processes for the aerospace, surface transportation, maritime, and offshore energy markets. Click Bond is the classic “invisible exporter,” a company that supplies parts to large U.S.-based manufacturers, which in turn export a majority of their products with the help of Ex-Im’s financing backing.

The aerospace industry is Click Bond’s oldest and biggest market—the company’s fasteners can be found on the 787 Dreamliner, F-35 Lightning II fighter jet, and even NASA’s Mars Curiosity Rover. Its largest strategic civil aviation customer is Boeing, which depends on Ex-Im to back competitive loans proffered to foreign purchasers of its airplanes.

Boeing is a frequent target of anti-corporate rhetoric from critics who would like to see the bank’s charter expire, but Click Bond Director of Strategic Partnerships Paul McNeill says those critics fail to recognize Ex-Im’s downstream impact on small and mid-size manufacturers that do not contract directly with Ex-Im Bank.

“A significant majority of components found on Boeing aircraft are manufactured by other companies—companies in Boeing’s supply chain,” McNeill says. “When someone sees a Boeing airplane in the sky, that’s not just the work of Boeing. It represents the contributions of thousands of small businesses.”

Without Ex-Im, Boeing would be at a disadvantage to its European rival Airbus, and its suppliers’ competitiveness would also suffer, according to McNeill. “When Boeing thrives, its U.S. suppliers become more competitive by investing in innovation and in processes that improve performance and lower costs. We can’t do that if Boeing isn’t selling airplanes. Boeing is an enormous economic engine that fuels competitiveness at multiple levels in the U.S. manufacturing base.”

Click Bond says that Ex-Im’s closure would jeopardize the jobs of its 400-plus employees, 80 percent of whom directly or indirectly support Boeing’s commercial airplane exports. “It would be a significant blow to our competitiveness,” McNeill states.