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Filed under: Hybrids/Alternative , Government/Legal , Green , Chrysler, LLC. , Ford , GM Remember the growing movement to caravan a few hundred of Detroit's most fuel efficient vehicles to the automaker's next meeting with Congress? Not happening. Interestingly, it wasn't for lack of support. In fact, it was just the opposite. So many people had voiced their support and announced their intentions to join in that the event's organizers just weren't able to keep up. Talk about a logistical nightmare. Organizers have not given up on the idea completely, launching a new website called TheEngineofDemocracy.com that's supposed to drum up support for Detroit and fuel efficient cars in general. Along with an outpouring of support via the interwebs, a list of 51 people from various suppliers, dealership workers and Union officials will accompany the CEOs of General Motors, Ford and Chrysler to Washington - one from each state plus one from the capital itself - to prove that...
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Filed under: Government/Legal , GM , Pontiac , Saab , Saturn When ants need to cross some dangerous span in order to get to the thing they want, certain ants in the colony will sacrifice themselves to build a bridge that other ants can cross. That's how you get the honey. In GM's case, the honey is a $12 billion government lifeline. The dangerous span is, well, extinction. And the sacrificial ants in this case could be Pontiac, Saturn, and Saab. Before the government would start writing checks (to the automakers, at least), Congress told GM (and Ford and Chrysler) to come back with a plan that gave some indication of long-term viability and a return to financial health. Supposedly, as part of such a plan, GM has looked at "shedding" the three brands in question, which would eliminate the massive costs associated with production, marketing and sales. But that would happen after massive payouts, some serious upheaval and tens of thousands of job losses. It would leave GM...
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Filed under: Government/Legal , Chrysler, LLC. , Daimler Daimler has already admitted that its 19.9% share in Chrysler is worth absolutely zero as far as its corporate balance sheets are concerned, but that's not stopping Cerberus from going after that remaining bit as it tries to become the sole owner of the beleaguered American automaker. Without full control of Chrysler, Cerberus would have a tough time offloading it in either one lump deal or in smaller, bit-by-bit transactions. But it sounds like Chrysler's majority owner isn't making life easy for Daimler, accusing the German entity of providing incomplete information about Chrysler and prolonging the actual sale that took place late in 2007. As you'd expect, Daimler is denying these accusations completely and is claiming that Cerberus is making outlandish demands to take the rest of the company off its German hands. Accusations beget accusations, so it's not terribly shocking that Cerberus has issued a press release...
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Filed under: Government/Legal , Jaguar , Land Rover Jaguar and Land Rover are having a Hell of a time trying to sell luxury vehicles in this armpit of a global economy, and parent company Tata Motors is looking for a big-time loan to keep the British Marquees afloat. In all, Tata is seeking £1 billion from the British government to to help pay the bills. That's a fairly large sum considering that it represents £67,000 to each of the British marquees 15,000 workers in the UK. Prime Minister Gordon Brown is said to be close to a decision regarding the loan, though it's likely the money would come with a stipulation that protects workers in the UK. We'd say that sales at Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles are in really bad shape, but the truth is that we don't even know how bad things have gotten. Tata has decided to stop providing US sales data for its struggling luxury brands. [Source: Drive ] Jaguar/Land Rover asking UK gov't for money originally appeared on...
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Filed under: Government/Legal , Chrysler, LLC. , Ford , GM President-Elect Barack Obama has been in favor of assisting Detroit automakers, but the soon-to-be Commander in Chief agrees with a Congressional demand to see concrete plans before any checks are signed. Obama's Cheif of Staff, David Axelrod, was all over the boob tube Sunday sharing the President Elect's thoughts on what the industry needs to do, saying a real plan to "retool and rationalize" is needed. Without a solid plan, Axelrod said there is little taxpayer dollars can do to fix the problem. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi added that she hopes the automakers have "gotten the message" about the need for a plan, which is due to Congress by December 2nd. Axelrod also took a bit of a shot at the Detroit execs when he said that they need to " take a commercial flight " to discuss the plan on December 8th. We'd take that a step further and suggest that the three automakers get in their most...
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Filed under: Etc. , Government/Legal , Opinion/Editorial There are plenty of people in this country who would desperately love to see all unions go away. Over the course of the congressional hearings on an automaker bailout this week many of those people have continually brought up the un-cited "fact" that UAW workers get $70/hour in wages and benefits as opposed to about $40 or so for non-unionized workers at the foreign owned transplants. While the UAW and the Detroit automakers have made more than their share of mistakes and deserve a good chunk of the blame for what is happening, there is a major problem with this particular argument. IT'S NOT TRUE! UAW members do not take home $70/hour. That is the automaker's cost per active employee. What's the difference? The latter figure is total spent by automakers on wages and benefits divided by the number of active employees. The cost of benefits includes the pensions and health care costs for the hundreds of thousands...
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Filed under: Government/Legal , Hirings/Firings/Layoffs , GM Much ado was made about the Big 3 CEOs choice of travel to Washington D.C. this week. Each one flew to our nation's capital in separate private jets, a fact that was mentioned by many politicians during two days of testimony before Congress. While it's this blogger's personal opinion that politicians took the opportunity to grandstand a bit too far on this point, nevertheless, it was a boneheaded move by the Big 3 that they should've seen coming. We've learned today that fewer employees will get to fly the friendly skies in one of General Motors' corporate jets, as the automaker has announced it will be ridding itself of two. That will cut down the current corporate fleet of leased jets from five to three, and an additional two were gotten rid of last September. In addition to dumping the G5s, GM is also cutting half its air travel staff and restricting all forms of employee travel to slow the rate of cash...
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Filed under: Minivans/MPVs , Government/Legal , Toyota Drumroll please! The most stolen vehicle in Japan is... the Toyota Hiace van! Bet that wasn't your first guess. The lowly Hiace has been creeping up the charts since 2005 when it was barely in the top ten. A year later it was fifth with a bullet. Now it's number one and not looking back. Scofflaws' taste for this workman van seems insatiable, and thefts of SUVs and luxury cars have dropped as a result. That's probably more to do with the anti-theft devices on those vehicles, which may have caused theft rings to target vans such as the Hiace instead because they usually don't have immobilizers or the like. After thieving the vans, they generally chop them up and ship them to developing countries in Asia, the Middle East and Africa. That's where Hiaces often show up as taxis, buses, or utility vehicles. Hiace engines even show up in fishing boats from time-to-time. Thanks for the tip, catgirlshyla! [Source: Japan...
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Filed under: Government/Legal , Chrysler, LLC. , Ford , GM , Celebrities While there is definitely a huge rift between those who favor a Detroit bailout and those who would rather see the Big 3 fade away, you'd think that someone like Flint-native and documentary maker Michael Moore would be all in favor of helping the Big Three succeed. After all, Moore rose to fame for his first documentary entitled "Roger and Me" that featured then-CEO of General Motors Roger Smith. According to this piece in the Detroit News , however, Moore doesn't profess unconditional support for a Big 3 bailout. It seems he has mixed feelings about the whole situation. Moore was on Larry King last night saying that the automakers ignored the wishes of consumers by continuing to build bigger vehicles just to maximize profits. Foreign automakers, on the other hand, built SUVs and more fuel-efficient vehicles in other categories. Moore elaborated by saying that the current managers don't deserve...
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Filed under: Government/Legal , Earnings/Financials Wow, what an amazing piece of political theater that just went down. As we reported, four senators from auto producing state (two Democrats and two Republicans) led by Michigan Senator Carl Levin have reached an agreement on a compromise bailout bill for automakers. They were set to announce details of the compromise bill at 2:30PM, but before they could, a team of Congressional Democrats led by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid walked into the room in which the press conference was to be held and announced that they didn't support the compromise bill and that CEOs of the Big 3 would have to come back after the Thanksgiving holiday and present a plan on how any loans that might be given would be used. Back to that compromise bill. The big stalemate, other than whether U.S. automakers should get a bailout at all, is where the money would come from. Democrats want to take $25 billion from the $700 billion...
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Filed under: Government/Legal , Earnings/Financials CNBC is reporting that four U.S. senators have reached a bipartisan agreement on a bill to help the Big 3 automakers in Detroit. Those senators include Michigan Democrats Carl Levin and Debbie Stabenow, Ohio Republican George Voinovich and Missouri Republican Christopher Bond. Details of the bill are not yet available, but a news conference is scheduled for 2:30PM EST, at which time we should learn more. It will likely be some compromise between the Democrats' wish for taking an extra $25 billion out of the $700 billion financial bailout fund and the plan supported by the White House that would allow automakers to use the already approved $25 billion in low interest loans for anything they wanted rather than just investing in green technology. Still, CNBC says the bill faces some big procedural hurdles, not the least of which is that senators want to go home soon for the Thanksgiving holiday. Trying to squeak in a vote before the break...
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Filed under: Government/Legal , Chrysler, LLC. , Ford , GM , Earnings/Financials There have been so many different arguments for why The Detroit 3 should or shouldn't get a bailout that we could make a casserole out of them. One argument against a bailout -- or at least, a reason for the futility of a bailout -- that we don't recall hearing yet is "vehicle density." The argument is put forth by Anthony Mirhaydari at MSN Finance. Basically, he says that with 981 cars per 1,000 people of driving age in America and new cars being sold faster than used ones are taken out of service, there simply isn't enough room for U.S. auto makers to sustain the volume of sales necessary to avoid factory closures and layoffs. As an argument against the bailout, though, we find it tenuous. No one is saying that Ford, GM and Chrysler won't need to cut a lot of fat whether or not they get bailed out. But the bailout is to aid the survival of the companies at all, not to prevent layoffs...
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Filed under: Government/Legal , Chrysler, LLC. , Ford , GM , Earnings/Financials Mitt Romney, former Massachusetts governor, former entrant in the marathon to win the White House, and current automotive industry expert (who knew?) had a few things to say in the New York Times today on the potential auto industry bailout. The opening paragraph says it all: "IF General Motors, Ford and Chrysler get the bailout that their chief executives asked for yesterday, you can kiss the American automotive industry goodbye. It won't go overnight, but its demise will be virtually guaranteed." Romney is not rooting for the end of the biz, but he believes that bankruptcy is the only way to save it because it will force a reset, and that will be the only way for the Detroit 3 to rectify entrenched structural problems. These include UAW contracts -- "a new direction for the UAW," executive perks -- "sanity in salary and perks," getting rid of old blood -- "management...
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Filed under: Government/Legal , Chrysler, LLC. , Earnings/Financials Chrysler still makes cars? Apparently so, and CEO Bob Nardelli was on Capitol Hill yesterday with his colleagues from Ford and General Motors, warning that the Pentastar is in serious danger of exhausting its reserves by early 2009. Chrysler's share of the $25 billion in aid the automakers are asking for stands at $7 billion, though at the current rate, that money wouldn't last long, possibly about one fiscal quarter. Senators are concerned that the automakers will turn into a monetary black hole, but the Detroit CEOs are trying to plead the case that securing some federal help will make it easier to emerge out the other side of this downturn. Nardelli did pledge to accept a $1 per year salary if it would help sway those with the purse strings. It would have been nice if he'd made that pledge to help his company and workforce, instead of it just being a token gesture to help him pick the pocket of the American...
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Filed under: Government/Legal , Chrysler, LLC. , Ford , GM , Earnings/Financials So here's a breakdown of what's going on in Congress concerning federal aid for U.S. automakers. A Senate bill expected to be voted on this Thursday would expedite funds for Ford, GM and Chrysler so that they could actually get the cash they need within 22 days after the bill becomes law -- should the bill become law. The $25 billion loan, paid back at an initial rate of 5-percent, would come out of the $700 billion bailout fund for financial institutions. The Senate's stipulations would be that the government receives "stock warrants or senior debt instruments to the government," similar to actions taken with banks that accessed the $700 billion. As well, top executives get no big payouts and stockholders get no dividends. The rumblings on the track indicate that unless the folks in favor can change a lot of minds before Thursday, the Senate bill has little hope of passing. That makes...
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