The (not really) silent bidding for British sports car maker Aston Martin still is undecided. The current  favorite appears to be the Mahindra Brothers in India, with  an Italian private equity group also interested. Allegedly, there is another courtier, and that is China’s Geely. (Read More…)

Usually, China gets accused of copying from America. This time, U.S. lawmakers will itch to copy a new Chinese law that comes in effect on January 1. Stealing this idea could help solve the current cash flow problems in Washington, and could provide a happy ending to the DC fiscal cliff-hanger. It also could provide an elegant way to eliminate disagreeable competitors. Car companies would not like it at all. (Read More…)

1,400 new cars, most of them Mitsubishis on their way from Japan and Thailand to Finland went to the bottom of an icy North Sea when the 485 foot car carrier Baltic Ace sunk off the coast of the southern Netherlands last night. (Read More…)

GM had a better November in China than at home in America. Back home, sales rose only 3.3 percent to 186,505 units in November. In China, the world’s and GM’s largest market, GM sold a total of 260,018 units across all joint ventures, up 9.7 percent compared to November 2011. (Read More…)

Forward contracts for popcorn skyrocketed at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, the Tokyo Commodity Exchange and other world markets after managers of Fiat and Nissan traded barbs about beauty.

Matt Davis, head of Fiat brand product marketing, hit first. (Read More…)

Toyota dropped out of Formula One in 2009, and said it won’t come back, claiming that the sports is “too elistist” and out of touch with Toyota’s customers. Now, the company is dropping hints that the door is not closed forever. Asked by The Nikkei [sub] whether Toyota might come back to the sport, Toyota Managing Officer Kiyotaka Ise was much less dismissive than in the past: (Read More…)

Each month, Bloomberg asks 15 or 16 analysts for their forecasts of the month’s sales data. But how good are they really? Knowing who has a good aim could make you a lot of money at the stock exchange, for instance. This is where TTAC comes in. Each month, we tell you who hit, who missed, and who is not even in the ballpark. Analysts who only give a SAAR and nothing else are being punished in this ranking.  Will just a SAAR help you to know whether you should buy Ford or short GM? Thankfully, the number of lazy analysts diminishes each month. And here are this month’s winners: (Read More…)

In late 2011, photos of melted and damaged Volt charging cords appeared on the internet. GM initially blamed wiring problems in the electrical outlets, eventually, the company announced that they would replace all the 120V chargers in all 2011 and some 2012 models with a new unit. About 9,500 charging units were replaced.

When the 2013 model came around, Volt owners were faced with a new and improved feature: Longer charge time. In self-help groups on the Internet, the culprit was quickly found:  GM had reduced the default circuit load of the charger from 12 Ampere to 8 Ampere. Then, a low intensity war on the message boards ensued, and is still rages on. Here the latest dispatches from the front:
(Read More…)

Buried In the depths of General Motor’s quarterly results is a routine litany of negative factors that could severely hamper the company’s future. One of them is “Significant changes in economic, political and market conditions in China.” GM intently monitors what is happening to Japanese brands in China, and it has more reason to watch with worries than with glee. What is happening to Toyota, Honda, and Nissan right now could just as easily happen to GM. The Japanese might shake off the troubles  – Japanese makers have seen worse in the very recent past. GM would be brought to its knees by a boycott of American cars in China. Quite possibly, one of the reasons behind the whole anti-Japanese exercise is to say “look what could happen to you.” Government Motors finds itself at the mercy of China. (Read More…)

Are you in the market for a full-size pickup? Hold your fire. With a little patience, you can profiteer from an all-out Battle of the BOFs. It’s a fight for your money, and for delivering optimistic 2012 sales goals. The noise you hear outside are the winds of war:  GM not only missed its truck sales goals in November, it also sits atop a 4 ½ month supply of full-size pickups taking up space (and cash) at dealer lots.  “We’ll continue to use all levers to influence inventory…,” said Kurt McNeil, GM’s VP of U.S. sales. “That includes first and foremost adjusting production and marketing activity.” Translation: Shutdowns and cash on the hood. (Read More…)

Forecasters expected a strong November as far as U.S. light vehicles sales go, and they got a strong November. Data after the jump. (Read More…)

Two years ago, China’s Geely bought Sweden’s (and Ford’s) Volvo lock, stock, and barrel. Among the assets: A few good Volvo platforms, along with a fair technology licensing contract from Ford. However, the platforms are not getting younger, and from what I heard back then, the licenses with Ford also have their limits. Geely has to invest into the future if Volvo is supposed to have one. Price of admission to the future: Many times the purchase price of the car company. (Read More…)

Chinese sales of Japanese makes continue to suffer from the fallout of the islands row. Toyota told Reuters that Chinese sales were down 22.1 percent YoY in November. Mazda’s China sales were down 29.7 percent compared to November last year, Reuters says.  The severity of the drops has lessened, but it will be a while until Japanese brands return to their regular growth pattern in China. (Read More…)

No car in recent history must have been so relentlessly covered at TTAC as the Toyota 86 and its dizzying assemblage of names and numbers. I don’t think there is an editor at TTAC who hasn’t reviewed the car at least three times. All except me. I only reviewed it twice. Something had to be […]

Some forecasters expected Japan’s appetite for new cars to drop by more than 20 percent in the last quarter after government incentives expired in September. So far, it is not happening. Sales of new cars, trucks and buses declined a minuscule 0.4 percent in November. Elsewhere you may read that the market was down 3.3 percent, but they are not giving you the whole story. Sales of mini vehicles, or kei cars actually were up in November, pulling the market nearly completely out of minus territory. (Read More…)