When you start advocating Federally backed “moon shots” as a way to compensate for the shortcomings of American management, you know you are in deep doo doo. Tom Friedman has a characteristically breathless article at at the New York Times arguing America better get off its duff because China is very serious about electric cars: […]
Read more...GM, with $75 bn in cash in reserves, bought AmeriCredit, a small subprime lender, in an all cash deal for $3.5 bn. GM is also currently in bankruptcy. AmeriCredit, which is rated BB by Fitch, was put on watch by Fitch, after the deal announcement. Fitch is unsure whether the deal will help or hurt […]
Read more...Felix guessed how this Structured Finance issue pipeline would get sorted out, for the moment. Three not necessarily inconsistent takes on causes and effects: A neat way to embarrass the government. The rating agency logjam and the GM deal announced yesterday are closely related: if there’s one thing GM will think it still needs for […]
Read more...Regulators Hired by Toyota Helped Halt Investigations Bloomberg and Bursting Pipes Lead to a Legal Battle New York Times. Faulty financial products, faulty cars, faulty pipes….what next? IMF Tells Bankers to Rethink Inflation Wall Street Journal (hat tip reader Don B) The Myth of Efficiency James Kwak Welcome to boarded-up Britain: One in eight shops […]
Read more...By Edward Harrison of Credit Writedowns Yves is going to be in a light posting mode, so I will be posting some links and a few posts for your reading pleasure. The first one is an update to some thoughts that Yves had on GMAC on the 27th. By the way, where is Jesse? I […]
Read more...The numbers aren’t as impressive as AIG’s but the general premise is the same. The automaker’s financial service arm it asking for a third taxpayer-provided cash transfusion. Might help if someone stanched the bleeding first. But no, bleeding is part of the game plan. The reason for more dough to GMAC is so GM and […]
Read more...The US tonight imposed steep tariffs on tires, a move directed against Chinese imports. From the Wall Street Journal: The Obama administration will put steep import duties on Chinese passenger and light truck tires, responding to what the U.S. International Trade Commission determined to be a surge of Chinese tire exports that has rocked the […]
Read more...It looks like I am being proven wrong on this one. I was of the view that the GM bankruptcy could get bogged down in court, since it had many more parties who could protest the use of section 363 to expedite asset sales than Chrysler did, some of whom also appeared to have better […]
Read more...Readers may recall that we’ve been of the view that the expedited bankruptcy planned for GM would run into more snags than its advocates assume. We have not felt as strongly on that point as far as Chrysler is concerned, since that deal has vastly fewer moving parts. Nevertheless, a hold-up on Chrysler illustrates the […]
Read more...Submitted by Edward Harrison of the site Credit Writedowns. We have just learned that Fiat has successfully completed its deal with Chrysler. This means that the bankrupt ‘Old Chrysler’ will now have far fewer cash and assets available for creditors and that it will be liquidated with large or total losses likely for creditors. Dissident […]
Read more...This is now getting interesting. Conventional wisdom among most bankruptcy commentors was that the objections to the Chrysler deal were not strong from a legal standpoint. Thus the fact that the Supreme Court has decided to stay the deal comes as a surprise, particularly to Team Obama, which has put its prestige and considerable muscle […]
Read more...The last person one might expect to criticize the Obama Administration bailout of GM is a unapologetic liberal like Robert Reich, labor secretary under Clinton. Yet he does precisely that in today’s Financial Times. And his logic is similar to the arguments made here and elsewhere against the bank rescue operations. Unlike some other commentators, […]
Read more...The New York Times discusses whether Americans will return to buying cars at the pre-bust level when conditions return to some level of normalcy. Of course, the subtext is that the US economy will get back on track later this year, when many those who anticipate growth starting 3Q/4Q, when pressed, say the recovery will […]
Read more...Submitted by Edward Harrison of the site Credit Writedowns. I was on the BBC yesterday talking autos and my commentary was almost entirely political. So, as we await the likely General Motors bankruptcy, I think it bears discussing how political this process has been and will continue to be. General Motors is a monster company […]
Read more...One of our oft repeated pet peeves has been that the effect of a bankruptcy filing on buyer appetite had not been assessed in the Chrysler or GM bankruptcy plans. We had argued it was vital to get a handle on it, since it would affect how much financing would be required in court and […]
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