From a high of $32 to the current $3, GM is in SERIOUS trouble.
All advice is to sell, the financial houses are refusing to buy until the price hits $1 or lower. In the last week alone the price has halved and continues to crash.

GM themselves have admitted they will be completely out of available cash and credit before the end of Q1 2009 and most likely sooner!

If this is allowed to happen it would have serious, far ranging repercussions for the whole of the automotive industry and manufacturing in general.
Can the American government stand by and watch while one of the bastions of US industry fails in such a spectacular fashion??

Probably will. It's hard to tell any more. I guess Goldman Sachs can just buy them out for 3 cents on a dollar. That's what happened in the last depression. Bankers, some bankers, made out like bandits.

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Originally Posted by Curlyben

From a high of $32 to the current $3, GM is in SERIOUS trouble.
All advice is to sell, the financial houses are refusing to buy until the price hits $1 or lower. In the last week alone the price has halved and continues to crash.

GM them selves have admitted they will be completely out of available cash and credit before the end of Q1 2009 and most likely sooner !!

If this is allowed to happen it would have serious, far ranging repercussions for the whole of the automotive industry and manufacturing in general.
Can the American government stand by and watch while one of the bastions of US industry fails in such a spectacular fashion ???

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GM deserves all that comes to them... dumb s. THey had success in their grasp... and tossed it into the trash.

Ever seen the documentary "Who killed the Electric car"? GM had a GREAT one, the EV-1. But once they successfully lobbied California to dump a law requiring such cars, they took them all and shreaded them, despite demand. Despite Holywood stars who were had them on lease and wanted to buy them... nope... all were taken by force by GM, hauled out to the desert and crushed.

Watch it sometime.

Who Killed the Electric Car? - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

GM needs to go DOWN. We need forward thinking auto makers here in the US. Not jokers like GM. I hope they get zero help from the government.

My own views is that they would be better served under chapter 11 bankruptsy laws than continuing to conduct business under a flawed and failed business model with Federal bailout money.
Airlines and the steel industry has used it to restructure .Why is GM exempt ? Because they are an icon ? That is poor excuse for the way they have conducted business. We already know that this too big to fall bs is a canard. GM is smaller than Lehman Bros. and they were allowed to go down.
As far as labor is concerned ;it is long past the time they should've sat down with management and restructured their collective bargaining agreement . A government bailout will not solve the problem that management and the UAW have not resolved. A bailout will just temporarily forestall the inevitable.
It is just a fact that the US currently has a higher assembly capacity than auto sales. Harder credit ,government mandates on design and energy prices will mean higher auto prices and that will mean reduced demand. The reason you are not reading about Toyota going down (although in the current economy they also are losing money) is that they have a better more rational worker /management relationship.
But America still loves cars and the market will be there is there if a healthy American auto company to exploit it. Bankruptsy will help them achieve it. Bailout will support status quo.
As we are seeing in the financial bailout ;nothing is being done to address the problems (liquidity ) the bailout was intended to address. That will be true of a GM bailout. GM will pay bondholders and employees billions of dollars of taxpayer money without addressing it's insolvency and business model. In short ;a bailout will do nothing to help GM survive.

Yes, I think they should.

If GM can't compete because of the UAW, poor management, uncompetitive vehicles, why should they deserve a bailout?

My only regret would be the loss of the Corvette.

The other automakers would fill in the vacuum left by GM [ Honda, Toyota, Nissan, VW etc... ] and prosper - and so would their employees.

The implication is that UAW would also fall - and President Elect Obama can't have that happen.

http://www.right-to-work.org/nl/nl200703p6.pdf

British Leyland was a vehicle manufacturing company formed in the United Kingdom in 1968 as British Leyland Motor Corporation Ltd (BLMC). It was partly nationalised in 1975 with the government creating a new holding company called British Leyland Ltd which became BL Ltd (later BL plc) in 1978. It incorporated much of the British owned motor vehicle industry, and held 40% of the UK car market, with roots going back to 1895.
Despite containing profitable marques such as Jaguar, Rover and Land Rover, as well as the best selling Mini, British Leyland had a troubled history. In 1986 it was renamed as the Rover Group, later to become MG Rover Group, which went bankrupt in 2005, bringing an end to mass car production by British owned manufacturers - with MG becoming part of Chinese Nanjing Automobile.
Jaguar and Land-Rover (Land-Rover previously owned by BMW) were sold in March 2008 by Ford to TATA Motors of India, who also bought the three brand names: Daimler, Lanchester, and Rover - the intellectual property rights for which had been bought by Shanghai, Nanjing bought MG brand.
British Leyland - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I knew that the ridiculously high gasoline prices were geared to wreck the US economy and could forsee the auto maker's problems when the price of gas went out of this world and people stopped buying cars and trucks that were not fuel efficient. The car companies were caught with their pants down as all they were making was overpriced large vehicles with the latest gadgets available. I still cannot fathom why anyone needs 75% of those gadgets on their cars anyway. Detroit should have put more effort into making more affordable vehicles versus the razzmatazz bling models. The unions wanting more and more money didn't help the automakers either.

Back in 1974 I bought a new Toyota Celica ST for $5,200. I hate to think what that car would cost today if I were to go buy one.

In 1976 I bought a new Dodge B200 van for $5,200. I hate to think of what that van would cost today.

We need to go back to the less sophisticated vehicles. You know, the ones that go from point A to point B and get us there. Not the ones that automatically turn the windshield wipers on when it rains or heats your behind when it's cold out or takes a post college degree to repair. I like the simpler vehicles. The ones you can repair with bobby pins if necessary. And don't forget duct tape repair either. Frankly I am sick to death of the constantly changing body styles of cars. Old VW had the right idea with the bug. It was originally the People's Car when it was first developed by Hitler. It's still around. Wonder why? Why? Because it was basic transportation that got you from Point A to Point B without a lot of unnecessary frills.

I hope they get their act together and file Chapter 11 bankruptcy and start making frill-less cars at affordable prices again. Who can afford a $20,000 automobile? Not me. Sorry.

Hello again:

I hear Apple is making a bid for GM. Steve Jobs has already designed the Icar.

excon

Looks like they just might get their wishes granted:

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Bob Nardelli's comments come as Chrysler and fellow "Big Three" US car firms Ford and General Motors (GM) seek a total $25bn (£17bn) in federal aid.

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BBC NEWS | Business | Chrysler calls for cash lifeline

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Originally Posted by excon

Hello again:

I hear Apple is making a bid for GM. Steve Jobs has already designed the Icar.

excon

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Is that like the Ipod only with wheels and a seat?

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Looks like they just might get their wishes granted

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Can Starbucks be far behind ? Its fourth-quarter profits dropped 97 percent this year . Guess the Masters of the universe aren't buying those triple mocha crapachinos lately .

Yesterday markets rallied late after President Bush warned of overly aggressive market regulation and defended the free market system.

He ought to start by reigning in his out of control Treasury Sec.

Today I saw one of those new Smart Cars. What a joke that was. It looks like two seats. No back seat. No trunk. Just two seats, a steering wheel and two doors. I asked the driver how much it cost. He told me $20,000! I jokingly asked him if it got 90 MPG. He told me, yes it did. Gee for $20,000 I could sure buy a heck of a lot of gasoline for $20,000.

Ford is very profitable in it's overseas markets. It's European cars are state of the art . The S-Max won car of the year. Why won't it sell here ? Because although it runs as clean and fuel efficient as any car on the market ,it cannot pass our rigid crash test standards. Small cars do not have to look like Smart Cars.

That Smart Car looked like I would make mincemeat out of it in my earth destroyer Jeep Grand Cherokee! I'd walk away from a crash with their car and they would go away to the morgue. I'd feel safer on a bicycle than that car any day. It looked all super gagedty and all but safe? Not in this lifetime.

If you want a real car that is affordable, fuel efficient, and meets safety and crash standards buy used:

Say something like a Civic or Corolla or Cobolt etc...

Vehicles are heavier due to safety standards [ not a bad thing ] and consumer preferences.

It costs big money to lighten a car with the use of special metals [ like aluminum, titanium, carbon fiber, or magnesium ].

When was the last time you saw a new car sold with a manual transmission,[ I doubt if > 10 % of Americans could drive one ] manually adjustable seats, no a/c, manual windows?

Composite materials could replace much of the metals in an auto ;including the passanger cage.Replace 1/2 the metal and you reduce the weight ,making it more fuel efficient without compromising safety .The weight would even make SUVs more fuel efficient.Formula 1 racers are made from carbon fiber .
Lighter vehicles may win 'Oil Endgame,' author says - MIT News Office

I am also a big proponent of conversion to natural gas autos or at least creating the infrastructure to offer that choice to consumers.

It burns clean .The Honda Civic GX is the cleanest internal-combustion powered car on the road. It's greener than a Toyota Prius . It is technology we already know and natural gas is plentiful in the United States. It would be a great leap towards energy independence.

A new large reserve was discovered in Alaska that adds to our already huge reserve.
Vast Frozen Natural Gas Deposits Discovered in Alaska

At very least this would buy time for the development of renewable sources of energy.