GM in Turmoil?

[whatsthat]

Remember that vaunted General Motors recovery ushered in by President Obama’s bold bailout program?

Well, not so much.

In June 2009, GM filed for Obama-managed bankruptcy, costing the taxpayer some $50 billion. The vast majority of that cash was never paid back by GM. In November 2010, GM issued a new initial public offering at a price of $33 per share. Today, GM stock is trading at approximately $19.36, down about 40% from its initial price.

And the executive turmoil in the company is reaching fever pitch. Opel, a majority-owned subsidiary of GM, dumped CEO Karl-Friedrich Stracke about two weeks ago. GM Vice Chairman Steve Girsky replaced him. Analysts immediately claimed, “GM appeared to be panicking as the change comes so soon after a turnaround plan for the struggling Opel was approved and a replacement was not named.” Another analyst stated, “The timing of today’s announcement bodes poorly for the condition of GM’s European business.” Then, Opel’s new design chief Dave Lyon was thrown out of the building before even beginning his job. Within the week, global marketing honcho Joel Ewanick got tossed.

Edmunds says that GM’s growth in the month of July will be essentially flat. GM is losing domestic market share at a rapid rate. From January to April 2012, GM lost 11% of its market share – about 300,000 vehicles of market share. Cadillac was down almost 25%.

Remember that big GM boom? It’s a lie. Obama may have bailed out GM, but he didn’t bail out the taxpayer – and in the long run, GM won’t be a viable business just because the government cut it a check.

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Governm.../GM-in-turmoil

[whatsthat]

GM Invests $600 Million in English Soccer Team
by Mike Flynn30 Jul 2012

Yes, General Motors really is giving $600 million to an English soccer club. Actually, as the team involved, Manchester United, is the most valuable team in sports, an investment in the club wouldn't be a bad idea, considering how everything else is going at General Motors. No, the $600 million GM is giving to Man United over the next 7 years is a sponsorship deal. In return, Man United will wear "Chevrolet" on their jerseys and GM will be able to call itself Man United's "global automobile partner." It will immediately have the edge with all those consumers who look to their favorite soccer club for car buying advice.

There is a very good reason government shouldn't bailout failing companies with buckets of taxpayer money. The money simply allows them to keep on making the disastrous decisions that got them to be a failing company in the first place. At least straight-up bankruptcy would have probably rooted out the kind of people who would think spending $60-70 million a year to have your logo on a soccer jersey was a swell idea.

The other problem with people whose pockets have been lined with lots of taxpayer cash is that they will overspend on their crazy ideas. Man United's current sponsor, AON, an insurance company was spending around $30 million a year to have their logo on the players' jerseys. So, they are throwing around twice the cash to advertise a brand that has almost no sales in Britain.

Note: Before AON, Man United's sponsor was AIG. See how that worked out.

Can we please stop bailing out failing companies? General Motors has moved from a tragedy to a farce.

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Governm...sh-soccer-team

[Daytimer]

Can we please stop bailing out failing companies?

Including banks? Yes?

[whatsthat]

Originally Posted by Daytimer

Including banks? Yes?

I say yes.......but need to break them up first.

Cannot have too big to fail banks

[Daytimer]

Holy ***t... I believe hell has officially frozen over. Though we wouldn't know it from the 105 it's supposed to be outside today.

[David]

But Obama said on TV that GM is doing better than ever. Paid all the money back... yada yada yada...

[whatsthat]

Originally Posted by David

But Obama said on TV that GM is doing better than ever. Paid all the money back... yada yada yada...

Liar in Chief

[socaltrojangal]

I spent all of last night at a GM dealer. Let me just say that it comes as no surprise to me, that they are really struggling. I'm sorry, but you couldn't pay me to drive one of their vehicles.

[pearceg]

Originally Posted by David

But Obama said on TV that GM is doing better than ever. Paid all the money back... yada yada yada...

Originally Posted by whatsthat

Liar in Chief

UPDATE: Government Motors bailout now cost US government $25 billion and may go even higher.

The Treasury Department says in a new report the government expects to lose more than $25 billion on the $85 billion auto bailout. That's 15 percent higher than its previous forecast.

The report may still underestimate the losses. The report covers predicted losses through May 31, when GM's stock price was $22.20 a share.

On Monday, GM stock was trading down 6 cents, or 0.2 percent, to $20.49. At that price, the government would lose another $850 million on its GM bailout.

The government still holds 500 million shares of GM stock and needs to sell them for about $53 each to recover its entire $49.5 billion bailout.

[whatsthat]

President Barack Obama on Thursday uttered the following utterly absurd thing:
“I want to (bailout) manufacturing jobs, not just in the auto industry, but in every industry.”

So let’s take a look at the auto bailout nightmare mess - and marvel at what President Obama wishes to multiplicatively replicate.*
(If some of the following sounds recently familiar, you must listen to gracious radio host-exemplar Mark Levin.)

We’re going to lose over $42 billion on the $82 billion auto bailout.* Obama in late 2009 said we would make money on it.

$26.5 billion of the loss was a straight payoff to the Democrat-apparatchik United Auto Workers (UAW) union.

During the bankruptcy process, President Obama illegally paid off the UAW first and in full - before secured bondholders who should have been made whole before anyone else got a dime.* Which was incredibly disruptive and destructive of the entire bond market.* Economic uncertainty, anyone?

Meanwhile, President Obama cut the pensions of non-union GM-subsidiary Delphi’s employees by up to 70%.

President Obama illegally carried forward through the bankruptcy the ridiculously exorbitant UAW contracts.* Which were a hay-yuge contributing factor to GM going under in the first place - and are again, predictably, helping to wreck the bottom line.

President Obama illegally allowed GM to carry forward through the bankruptcy $45.4 billion in losses - which serve as post-bankruptcy write-offs, costing We the Taxpayers $18 billion in lost tax revenue.* GM paid absolutely no income tax in 2011.* See, Senator Reid, this is what a non-anonymous source looks like.

We are still stuck with 500+ million shares of GM stock.* For us to break even, they must be sold at $54 per.* They debuted post-bankruptcy at $33 per.* They are now at around $20 per.* Setting us up for a nearly $17 billion loss – just on the stock.

Why has the stock tanked so precipitously?* Because GM is no longer a for-profit car company - it is a Leftist ideological entity.*

To wit:
90+% of GMs auto loans are now of the Freddie Mac-Fannie Mae-esque subprime variety - made to people the vast majority of whom GM and everyone else knows can’t pay them back.

Chevrolet Volts cost $41,000 to make, and sell for $41,000.* It is a non-profit vehicle.* Yet GM has spent millions advertising it - trying desperately to sell a Leftist fantasy car that makes them no money.*

Even more inane, GM just spent $10.4 million to build a Chevy Volt-ville - an Obama Candy Land Potemkin village.*And lest we forget - there was the Chevy Volt song...and dance.
And yet Volt sales remain, as always, pathetic.* Perhaps because it only gets 35 miles to a 12-hour charge, and costs twice as much as a similar-sized regular gasoline mobile.

And despite these terrible sales, GM is bulling forward with a Buick Crossover hybrid.* And two Buick hybrid sedans.* And a Yukon.* And a Chevy Malibu Eco.* And a Chevy Tahoe.* And two Chevy pick-up trucks.* And a Cadillac Escalade.* Misery, of course, loving bankrupt company.

GM in 2010 launched a $100 million venture capital division (it’s ObamaMotors - not Mitt Romney’s Bain - so I guess it’s ok).* Which is investing in fabulously successful things like...solar panel companies.
In fact, no company on Planet Earth - pardon me, Mother Gaia - registered in 2010 more (non-)green (non-)energy patents than GM.

We the Taxpayers pay $7,500 per Volt sold in bribe money - I mean incentive.* And in President Obama’s latest unanimously rejected budget he wanted to up that to $10,000 per.** As of November of last year, the total Volt subsidy Taxpayer cost was $250,000 per Volt sold.

Another contributing factor to the Volt’s non-sales: Obama and GM admit to only one Volt fire - dangerously rabbit-holing at least five fires and a whole host of attending Volt charging problems that have not yet been adequately explained.

The auto bailout was supposed to “create or save” American jobs.* But it killed 100,000 gigs right out of the gate - via President Obama’s forced closings of Republican-owned GM and Chrysler dealerships.
GM is in fact currently creating gigs - in China.* Where they in 2011 sponsored a movie celebrating the Communist Revolution’s 90th anniversary.

And so on, and so on, and....

All of this slow-motion train wreck-litany - is President Obama’s vision for how we should from now on do all things economy.

Because for this President, "success" doesn't mean greater free market achievement - it means greater government control.