Continental Airlines plans to issue $390m in securities backed by new and older Boeing aircraft, the aviation industry’s first securitised-debt sale of its kind in more than a year and the latest signal the credit markets are reopening to carriers hungry for capital.

Industry executives and bankers viewed the offering as a bright spot for an industry otherwise beset by a slumping demand in air travel, rising jet-fuel prices and meagre stock prices. While a more welcoming debt market will not reverse any of those challenges, it may help some carriers endure the brutal downturn.