Gadzillions of Citibank customers worldwide (the writer of these lines included) were sweating through the weekend, popping Valium, worried that their sleepless bank may go to eternal rest. Then, relief: Citi was bailed out. No hearing, no fuss, $326b total, Wagoner, eat your heart out. But wait: moiré dark clouds on the horizon: “The foundering Detroit automakers owe more than $100 billion to their bankers and bondholders, and Wall Street is starting to wonder how much of that will be paid back,” writes the New York Times. And wait, there is even more exposure, namely to “to automotive suppliers and dealers.”

A lot of the debt is in the way of bonds that have been foisted on hapless 401K holders that had ticked the “conservative” investment goal on their profile. These bonds are now depreciating faster than the junk produced in Detroit. If you have the stomach for it, you can buy GM’s 8.375 percent bonds due in July 2033 for 17 cents on the dollar. Even a Mike Milken wouldn’t have the guts. Flashback: At Milken’s sentencing, Judge Kimba Wood told Milken: “When a man of your power in the financial world repeatedly conspires to violate, and violates, securities and tax business in order to achieve more power and wealth for himself, a significant prison term is required.” This country’s legal system is based on case law, and quite possibly, Kimba’s sentence before the sentence may come up again. This time, for milken tax payers, retirees, and banks alike. Speaking of banks …

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Hey, it’s Monday! Time to get back to work (if only to check that there still is a job.) Get a hustle on, most of the world got up much earlier. While America Slept (WAS) is a daily round-up of the news that happened in other continents and time-zones. TTAC provides round-the-clock coverage of everything that has wheels. Or that has its wheels coming off.

What are they smoking? To convince Congress that they mean action, GM wants to negotiate a cut in debt levels, wants to ask the UAW whether it’s ok to delay a $7 billion payment to a union retiree health fund, GM wants to drop brands, and get more funding from GMAC, Bloomberg reports. All that done before a “10-12 page report” will be submitted by 12/2? Don’t bogart that joint …

How to make a lot of money: Buy GM’s GM’s 8.375 percent bonds due in July 2033. Last Friday, that bond went for 17 cents on the dollar, Bloomberg writes, citing a report of Trace, the bond-price reporting system of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority. The bond with a rating lower than most GM cars will yield you 49 percent interest, and you can retire worry-free. Or not.

Chery pickins: China’s home-grown (non JV) Chery will expand up and down, Gasgoo says. On the up, they will continue their partnership with US-based Quantum LLC. Intent: A high-end brand for the export market. On the down, they will launch a low-end brand called “Karry.” Already, your basic Chery QQ3 can be bought for $4K in China. How low can you go?
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At this week’s LA Auto Show Honda’s vice president of corporate planning and logistics told Marketwatch that Honda is considering expanding production of its popular Fit to the United States. “We have about 19 days worth of supply, which is much too low,” said Honda VP Dan Bonawitz. “We can’t fill all our dealer orders.” Honda is “exploring all options” to ramp-up Fit supply, Bonawitz said.

Barack Obama’s turd blossom David Axelrod appeared on ABC’s “This Week” today (via Reuters), quietly backing the president-elect away from is electorally-necessary support for an automaker giveaway. “We all have a stake in the survival and the prosperity of the auto industry,” said the future senior White House adviser. “But in order to do that, they’re going to have to retool and rationalize their industry for the future,” he said. “If they don’t do that, then there’s very little that taxpayers can do to help them.” This puts Obama back on the same page as the congressional Democrats, who have been markedly less supportive of a bailout since the Detroit CEO’s miserable performance before the House Financial Services Committee this week. “There must be a business model that they work off of,”  Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi tells CBS’ “Face the Nation. “No one would invest in a company without seeing that, nor should taxpayer dollars be invested without seeing that business model and that business plan.” The real question then seems to be, what do Obama, Pelosi, et al expect to see in the way of a new plan come December 2? Because other than being sure that they want to see a plan, we haven’t got much from them in the way of specifics.

We don’t write about motorsports here at TTAC. Well, except for that one time. Actually, we don’t write many E85 BOTD’s these days either. Ethanol and its lobby are in something of a retreat right now, as bailout fever crowds agriculture out of its VIP seat at the pork pump. Not to mention the fact that the MSM now seems to recognize E85 as the wasteful, pork-fueled debacle it is.  Anyway, despite the fact that the US has a glut of ethanol thanks to already set (and non-demand-based) subsidy goals, the Indianapolis Racing League has just concluded a contract to import sugar cane ethanol from Brazil to power its racers from 2009 and beyond. But don’t worry, under the terms of the multi-year deal, APEX-Brasil in cooperation with UNICA (the Brazilian Sugarcane Industry Association) will seek a partnership with a US-based ethanol company to supply the IndyCar Series with corn-based ethanol as well. Why? “The move to other sources of ethanol is a natural progression as the ethanol industry continues to grow and evolve. We continue to strive to be on the leading edge of the greening of racing. The IndyCar Series was the first motorsports series to mandate use of a renewable fuel, and now we will work with the ethanol industry in both the United States and Brazil to promote the use of all types of ethanol by consumers,” says IRL President Terry Angstadt. The only greening here is greenbacks being sent from Brazil, which is spending millions aggressively marketing its ethanol around the world.

Conan O’Brien presents Detroit’s call for bailout bucks.

When Autoblog caught wind of the Latin American Herald Tribune story quoting GM Brazil’s CEO as saying GM would invest $1b worth of US bailout money in Brazilian operations, they knew there was something weird about the story. Ya think? The original LAHT story paraphrases (rather than directly quoting) GM Brazil’s Jaime Ardila as saying GM’s $1b investment would come from bailout bucks, lending some credence to the official GM position that “something got lost in translation.” But even if the LAHT’s translation was completely accurate, GM would have denied this story up and down. Investing American tax dollars in the developing world? Perish the thought. For one thing, there is no bailout. Yet. If Ardila did say that bailout bucks were going to Brazil, he was way off the reservation, and endangering the still-slim odds of a bailout happening. In any case, we will know what the bailout bucks will be spent on when GM submits their plans for the money to congress on December 2. And don’t bet on seeing a billion dollar line-item for Brazilian investment, for the obvious political reasons. But as an international company that has been supported for years by its overseas units, GM will have to finesse its bailout plan to appeal to congress’s national interests. With nothing but cuts in sight for GM’s North American operations, the General will have to rely ever more heavily on profits from its growth markets abroad to achieve the “viability” congress wants to see. Unfortunately, that viability trades off directly with the bailout’s other goal, which is saving American jobs. Such are the dangers of national bailouts of multinational corporations.

Last week, Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski clinched a deal to bring Nissan’s pure-electric cars to his state. Then, he went on to Shenzen, China. “At BYD Auto Co., China’s fast-growing automotive star, a plug-in electric hybrid sedan is just weeks from meeting millions of Chinese consumers” writes the Oregonian. “The F3DM, which runs up to 80 miles on a single charge and packs a 7-gallon tank, will probably launch in the United States by 2010.” The Governor wants it to be built in Oregon. On Friday, he met with BYD President Wang Chuanfu. On a 10-day business trip through Asia, Kulongoski had laid out his vision to automakers in Japan and China: Electric charging stations every 60 miles along interstates. Tax incentives for Oregonians to buy electric cars. Tax bonuses for drivers to build car chargers in their garages. And, unspoken, but you can bet on it: generous incentives for those who bring their factories to Oregon. Then, Kulongoski has guanxi, connections, indispensable for a successful Chinese deal…

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My first American girlfriend’s mother, a Manhattan slumlord, read the Kiplinger Letter. She drove a Ford. My American (former) mother-in-law (different person) read the Kiplinger Letter. She drove a Ford. Kiplinger’s paid circulation is a million; their website receives more unique visits than even TTAC, about 2m a month. When Kiplinger writes, America listens. And what’s on Kiplinger’s mind these days? “Should you buy a Detroit car?” Not a general question. They mean now, considering the dire circumstances. Kiplinger asks the question that is on the mind of the remaining 48.2 percent of Americans that still buy true blue American: “What are the risks of buying a vehicle from a carmaker that’s on the brink?”

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The story about the defiled Lambo triggered a lively discussion about cars, hentai, anime, and otaku. Even about cosplay bars in Tokyo’s Akihabara (I’ve seen them all, boring.) Obviously, we had heretofore neglected a topic of high interest amongst our readership. In preparation for an even bigger role of Japanese transplants in the U.S., here some cross-cultural sensitivity training.

Never on Sunday? Not so at TTAC, a 24/7/365 world-class operation. While America Slept (WAS) is a daily round-up of the news that happened in other continents and time-zones. TTAC provides round-the-clock coverage of everything that has wheels. Or that has its wheels coming off.  Disclosure: Mostly bad news today.

Let’s get small: VeeDub doesn’t want to leave the cars-for-lilliputians segment to the Smart 42, or the Toyota iQ. Based on a chopped version of their upcoming (2010) VW Up, Wolfsburg wants to launch a fuel-sipping 2seater. Target is 2 liter per 100km (118 MPG.) Unconfirmed rumor as per Automobilwoche (sub.)  The oil-burning Smart ForTwo gets 71 MPG.

Let’s get cheap: Fiat plans low cost cars for the European market. Under a separate brand, says Automobilwoche (sub.) Fiat Group CEO Sergio Marchionne says he wants to be the “Wal-Mart for cars.”  Chinese imports, anyone?  “Ma no!” says FIAT. Together with their Brazilian subsidiary FIASA, FIAT works on two el cheapo cars under codenames Project 326 und 327. Then there’s another one of unknown provenance.

Nothing sacred anymore at Daimler: According to Daimler’s hometown paper Stuttgarter Zeitung, “all investments which don’t add to efficiencies and competitiveness are cancelled.” Travel, overtime, outsourcing, everything needs to be cut. The whole company is under review. Grim sales numbers. Even the green may see pruning: Investments in plug-ins, hybrids and fuel cell may get chopped. More bad news to follow …

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Mining of Ford’s microsite (MICROSITE!) extravaganza – which gave us substantial info about the 2010 Fusion – has proven useful again. Now Ford has released what are at least preliminary data for the 2011 Fiesta – which should be on sale some time in the next 12 months (but when? and why not in the last 12 months?). The microsite (MICROSITE!) says “on the pavement in early 2010”

Engine will be the 1.6 liter Ti-VCT 4-banger. In Europe this engine has 118 horsepower. Ti-VCT apparently indicates twin independent variable cam timing. I assume some of TTAC’s engineering oriented readers will tell the rest of us if that’s significant or something that Yugo has been doing since 1959.

Transmission to be a Ford “Powershift” automatic – that’s a dual clutch gearbox. We blogged about this transmission in the Focus here. No word if a traditional stick will come to North America. Cue frustration, comments about “no stick no buy.” For the record, I love my DSG.

Stuff – Microsoft SYNC, Bluetooth, leather seats, standard electronic stability control. Also the Fiesta will offer “up to” seven airbags (dual front, thorax, curtain, and driver’s knee), and the use of the “up to” phrase means the value stripped out cars on dealer lots won’t have ’em.

Fire and pickaxes were used to damage speed cameras in Italy and the Czech Republic this week. On Tuesday, a speed camera was set on fire on the Boulevard D’Annunzio near the Tuscan seaside resort town of Marina di Pisa. The profitable device has been issuing at least one hundred tickets per month over the last year and a half. Firefighters arrived on the scene quickly enough to extinguish the blaze before the camera was destroyed, according to a report in La Nazione. Vigilantes in Czech town of Moravske Budejovice attacked a Traffipax speed camera with a pickaxe. A video of the incident shows the device receiving five hits on the side, although photographs of the aftermath on autoforum.cz show additional hits to the front of the housing, including one to the camera lens. A group calling itself the “Crum Patch Team” took responsibility for the attack. Describing themselves as “polite and honest” people, the members issued a statement explaining how local politicians use photo enforcement for revenue, not safety, purposes. The group added that attempts to resolve the situation through the normal political process have failed.

Now that GM has launched its PR response to Jet-Gate, Ford is also taking steps to be ensure that it is perceived as an austere, efficient company. And no, they’re not making Mulally give up his Lexus (he was already supposed to have, although ABC News appears to have caught hime in flagrante delicto with his LS430 as recently as this summer). The AP reports that post-begathon criticism has Ford staff “looking at all of our operations to reduce costs and operate more efficiently,” which just might include giving up some undisclosed number of the five jets it currently operates. “Ford’s top priority is to continue making progress on our transformation plan, and we do not want anything to distract us,” spokesman Mark Truby said in a statement. “We are exploring all cost-effective solutions for our air travel.” Ford operated nine jets in 2005, when its stock price opened the year at $13.17. Ford’s stock is currently valued at $1.43 per share.

Salão do automóvel 2008 – Stand Platinuss

How’s that air quality treatin’ ya?