diff --git a/spring-kafka/src/main/java/org/springframework/kafka/core/DefaultKafkaProducerFactory.java b/spring-kafka/src/main/java/org/springframework/kafka/core/DefaultKafkaProducerFactory.java
index 2af05dcbb0..8adf37de9c 100644
--- a/spring-kafka/src/main/java/org/springframework/kafka/core/DefaultKafkaProducerFactory.java
+++ b/spring-kafka/src/main/java/org/springframework/kafka/core/DefaultKafkaProducerFactory.java
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 /*
- * Copyright 2016-2020 the original author or authors.
+ * Copyright 2016-2021 the original author or authors.
  *
  * Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
  * you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
@@ -58,6 +58,7 @@
 import org.springframework.context.ApplicationListener;
 import org.springframework.context.event.ContextStoppedEvent;
 import org.springframework.core.log.LogAccessor;
+import org.springframework.kafka.KafkaException;
 import org.springframework.kafka.support.TransactionSupport;
 import org.springframework.lang.Nullable;
 import org.springframework.util.Assert;
@@ -716,7 +717,20 @@ private CloseSafeProducer<K, V> doCreateTxProducer(String prefix, String suffix,
 		}
 		checkBootstrap(newProducerConfigs);
 		newProducer = createRawProducer(newProducerConfigs);
-		newProducer.initTransactions();
+		try {
+			newProducer.initTransactions();
+		}
+		catch (RuntimeException ex) {
+			try {
+				newProducer.close(this.physicalCloseTimeout);
+			}
+			catch (RuntimeException ex2) {
+				KafkaException newEx = new KafkaException("initTransactions() failed and then close() failed", ex);
+				newEx.addSuppressed(ex2);
+				throw newEx; // NOSONAR - lost stack trace
+			}
+			throw new KafkaException("initTransactions() failed", ex);
+		}
 		CloseSafeProducer<K, V> closeSafeProducer =
 				new CloseSafeProducer<>(newProducer, remover, prefix, this.physicalCloseTimeout, this.beanName,
 						this.epoch.get());