China’s auto sales have most likely broken the 10 million unit sound barrier at the time of this typing. This according to educated estimates of the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) via Gasgoo. The association expects annual sales for 2009 to surpass 12 million.
In September, China’s auto sales had soared 78 percent (compared to September of the prior year) to 1.33m units. Sales of passenger cars, including sedans, SUVs and MPVs, rose 83.6 percent to 1.02m units. September marked the seventh straight month in a row that China’s car sales exceeded one million units a month. (Read More…)
The outsourcing v.v. insourcing debate has been waged for decades in the auto industry. GM just realized there is one. “The balance of power has shifted. The profits are made by the people who have the technological know-how, and that’s the suppliers,” quoth GM Europe VP Carl-Peter Forster last night, while Focus was taking notes.
Forster is expected to take over the CEO job of Opel, owned by the Magna/Sberbank/GM cabal. Is he just pandering to the new guys in charge? Oh no. Just the opposite . . . (Read More…)
The tires v.v. chicken war has sent stock exchanges lower. It has the price of rubber plunging. It has people deeply worried. The Wall Street Journal has arrayed comments from economists around the world who call the Obama decision everything from “something really stupid” to “disappointing news.”
State-run Chinese news agency Xinhua trotted out their own team of experts, which came to the conclusion that “the new U.S. tariffs on Chinese tire imports could escalate trade disputes between the two countries, but a full-blown trade war is unlikely.” What, no trade war? Wait, there’s worse. (Read More…)
If you are tired of carmageddon, and you are not ready for the dizzying near-triple-digit growth rates of China, go to Ye Olde Country (as long as your $ still buys something). Europe as a whole is slowly clawing its way back into a territory long forgotten: Growth. Slow, but steady growth. (Read More…)
The Chinese aren’t messing around with this one. On Friday, Obama slapped a 35 percent punitive tariff on Chinese tires. On Monday, a soon as the WTO was open for business, China filed a formal complaint against the United States of America with the World Trade Association in Geneva, China Daily reports.
As predicted by TTAC, the second casualty after Chinese tires will be American cars exported to China. Next in line (who would have thunk it:) American chickens exported to China. Collateral damage: Up to 200K jobs, both in China and the USA.
Pundits across the spectrum are still aflutter over the alleged final-honestly-we-mean-it-this-time-it’s-for-real-fer-sure sale of Opel to Magna and their Russian Sberbankers. Along with the geopolitical impact thereof. What they all miss: The deal may not go down. Especially not after GM laid down some outrageous “conditions” for the sale . . .
President Obama paid his outstanding union dues and slapped a 35 percent punitive tariff on Chinese car and light truck tires exported to the USA. The new duty will take effect on September 26 and comes in addition to an existing 4 percent duty, Reuters reports. Everybody, except for the United Steelworkers, agrees that this is one of the most boneheaded decisions of the new administration.
Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel herself has confirmed that GM is ready to sell Opel to Magna. The offer comes with yet to be disclosed conditions. However, according to news-adhoc, Frau Merkel “doesn’t have the impression that behind the announcement of Opel is a hidden agenda that sets the threshold so high that in the end there won’t be a sale.” This is politico-speak for: “Do we smell a rat here?” Das Handelsblatt has more details.
The increasingly active GM BOD (Chairman Edward Whitacre Jr. is even to star in a TV commercial, usually not the job of a Chairman) convened, canned the CFO Ray Young and did the unthinkable: They came to a conclusion about (their version of) the fate of Opel. Nothing is clear at the moment, but indications are it may be Magna after all.
The United Steelworkers had a big hand in putting Barack Obama in power. Now they want some payback. The United Steelworkers lodged a complaint that a flood of cheap Chinese tires had cost more than 5,000 union jobs in recent years. Obama has until Sept.17 to rule that the White House put a 55 percent tariff on tires imported from China. Which would be the end of Chinese tire imports. Tires? Steelworkers? (Read More…)
Aw shucks, I was wrong. In my usual exuberance, I had said that triple digit growth could be in the cards for August auto sales in China. Big mistake. China’s passenger vehicle sales, including sedans, MPVs, SUVs and minivans grew only 94.7 percent year-on-year to 849,376 units in August, China Daily reports.
“The booming sales in August have surpassed even the boldest prediction in the industry, as sales in August were previously the weakest of the year,” said Cui Dongshu, deputy secretary-general of the National Passenger Car Information Exchange Association.
China is well on its way to sell more than 12 million vehicles this year.
China is expected to manufacture a record 12 million vehicles in 2009, said Chen Bin, director of the department of industry under the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) via Gasgoo. This is a lowball estimate.
It’s the Audi version of the swine flu: foot in mouth disease. It has reached pandemic proportions at the four-ringed brand. First, Audi of America’s Prez Johann De Nysschen called (rightly or wrongly) the Volt “a car for idiots,” insulting green leanings and national pride. Now, Audi Finland’s sales chief Esko Kiesi forgot that hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. In an interview with the Finnish woman’s magazine, Anna, Audi’s Finnish sales chief revealed that “Technical jobs can’t be mastered by women without the help of a man.” And that was one of the more benign statements. In a woman’s magazine.
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