U.S. Expected to Own 70% of Restructured G.M.

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Double Trouble

Elite Member
Oct 9, 1999
9,270
103
106
Originally posted by: Craig234
<useless drivel snipped>

Dredging up old nonsense to try and prove a non-existent point that democrats are wonderful and republicans are bad. Yeah, nothing dumb about that at all, thinking that one side always has the right answers :roll:

How you think it's good for the economy not to buy from GM and support our nation's auto workers and the repayment of their borrowing and sustaining our auto industry - I don't think you have any argument for it.

I don't want to give my hard earned money to the crappy union. Whether GM goes bankrupt now or they just keep sucking up more and more money from the taxpayer, it's still going to be a drain. I don't want to help prolong that problem. Finally, we know how well union and government run things work. Quality will inevitably go down, and I'm not going to shell out my money to buy crappy quality.

Rational thinking... you should give it a try sometime.

 

Ktulu

Diamond Member
Dec 16, 2000
4,354
0
0
Originally posted by: Svnla
Originally posted by: XZeroII
Crappy products that no one wants? You realize that Toyota lost MORE money than GM did this past quarter, right? Are they making crappy products that no one wants? It's idiots like you who keep spreading misinformation that makes a bad situation worse. It's obvious that you don't know jack about the situation yet you speak as if you are an expert. There is PLENTY of actual information available on the internet. Look it up and get back to us.

Facts = GM in its glory days had a market share (in the US) of over 50%....as of right now, it has about 20% (give and take) market share. Look like the customers know what they want.

GM's market share did not simply shrink so bad because of their products, it's because people are scared to buy products from a company that they are afraid will not be around to support their warranties and mantainance. Why the hell do you think Ford has sales have been growing over the last month, people know their going to be around, not so sure about GM though.
 

Svnla

Lifer
Nov 10, 2003
17,986
1,388
126
Originally posted by: Ktulu
Originally posted by: Svnla
Originally posted by: XZeroII
Crappy products that no one wants? You realize that Toyota lost MORE money than GM did this past quarter, right? Are they making crappy products that no one wants? It's idiots like you who keep spreading misinformation that makes a bad situation worse. It's obvious that you don't know jack about the situation yet you speak as if you are an expert. There is PLENTY of actual information available on the internet. Look it up and get back to us.

Facts = GM in its glory days had a market share (in the US) of over 50%....as of right now, it has about 20% (give and take) market share. Look like the customers know what they want.

GM's market share did not simply shrink so bad because of their products, it's because people are scared to buy products from a company that they are afraid will not be around to support their warranties and mantainance. Why the hell do you think Ford has sales have been growing over the last month, people know their going to be around, not so sure about GM though.

GM went down (marketshare) steadily within the last 50 years. Their problems just didn't happen over night. Ford is up a bit but still has not up to its old glory days. Heck, I doubt that the big 3 will ever be.
 

Ktulu

Diamond Member
Dec 16, 2000
4,354
0
0
Originally posted by: Svnla
Originally posted by: Ktulu
Originally posted by: Svnla
Originally posted by: XZeroII
Crappy products that no one wants? You realize that Toyota lost MORE money than GM did this past quarter, right? Are they making crappy products that no one wants? It's idiots like you who keep spreading misinformation that makes a bad situation worse. It's obvious that you don't know jack about the situation yet you speak as if you are an expert. There is PLENTY of actual information available on the internet. Look it up and get back to us.

Facts = GM in its glory days had a market share (in the US) of over 50%....as of right now, it has about 20% (give and take) market share. Look like the customers know what they want.

GM's market share did not simply shrink so bad because of their products, it's because people are scared to buy products from a company that they are afraid will not be around to support their warranties and mantainance. Why the hell do you think Ford has sales have been growing over the last month, people know their going to be around, not so sure about GM though.

GM went down (marketshare) steadily within the last 50 years. Their problems just didn't happen over night. Ford is up a bit but still has not up to its old glory days. Heck, I doubt that the big 3 will ever be.

Yeah, but there's also a shit load more competition from overseas than there was 50 years ago so it's almost expected.
 

woodie1

Diamond Member
Mar 7, 2000
5,947
0
0
Originally posted by: Ktulu
Originally posted by: Svnla
Originally posted by: Ktulu
Originally posted by: Svnla
Originally posted by: XZeroII
Crappy products that no one wants? You realize that Toyota lost MORE money than GM did this past quarter, right? Are they making crappy products that no one wants? It's idiots like you who keep spreading misinformation that makes a bad situation worse. It's obvious that you don't know jack about the situation yet you speak as if you are an expert. There is PLENTY of actual information available on the internet. Look it up and get back to us.

Facts = GM in its glory days had a market share (in the US) of over 50%....as of right now, it has about 20% (give and take) market share. Look like the customers know what they want.

GM's market share did not simply shrink so bad because of their products, it's because people are scared to buy products from a company that they are afraid will not be around to support their warranties and mantainance. Why the hell do you think Ford has sales have been growing over the last month, people know their going to be around, not so sure about GM though.

GM went down (marketshare) steadily within the last 50 years. Their problems just didn't happen over night. Ford is up a bit but still has not up to its old glory days. Heck, I doubt that the big 3 will ever be.

Yeah, but there's also a shit load more competition from overseas than there was 50 years ago so it's almost expected.

And that competition is what caused the domestic companies to make a far better car than they would otherwise be building right now. Competition is what improves the product - any product - you either make it better with minimal price increases or your market share falls.
 

SSSnail

Lifer
Nov 29, 2006
17,458
83
86
From an anonymous person
Obama has said he expects GM to emerge from restructuring (aka
bankruptcy) a stronger company. That doesn't mean they aren't going
BK which will ZERO out your stock value. But hey, laws and basic math
are irrelevant compared to the power of some first time congressmen
that had the presidency handed to him. He must be at least 10x as
powerful as Bush, who despite being groomed from birth failed
miserably, he must be, really smart people like Oprah say so. They
even have bumper stickers that call him "the one", it must be true.

Please do buy all the GM stock you can afford, in fact if I were you,
I'd go take money out of your 401K account as leverage. As long as
you put it back in 60-90 days you can do this without paying any kind
of early withdrawal penalties. After that 60-90 days point there is a
pretty heavy penalty, but don't worry, you should have quadrupled your
investments by then. What's the worst that could happen, the
government has you covered, just like they the had hurricane Katrina
folks covered, so you should be rolling in $$$ before that 60-90 day
period kicks in.

It's a no brainer, Obama says so, if you can't count on a liberal
politician to lay out more corporate welfare who can you trust, right?

GO FOR IT, who cares about that $173B in liabilities is more then
double their $83B in assets, that's just silly balance sheet
mathematics, it's nothing compared to what can be accomplished via
politics and propaganda. That's how they sold the Iraq war and it
turned out great. What's the worst that could happen?

Who cares if they can't sell cars, who needs to sell cars when there
is always another welfare check coming. Obama may have to write some
more welfare checks, NO PROBLEM.

So by all means available to you, 401K, loan sharks, food stamps, just
BUY, BUY, BUY, go big or go home, what are you some kind of sissy?
 

rchiu

Diamond Member
Jun 8, 2002
3,846
0
0
Originally posted by: SSSnail
From an anonymous person
Obama has said he expects GM to emerge from restructuring (aka
bankruptcy) a stronger company. That doesn't mean they aren't going
BK which will ZERO out your stock value. But hey, laws and basic math
are irrelevant compared to the power of some first time congressmen
that had the presidency handed to him. He must be at least 10x as
powerful as Bush, who despite being groomed from birth failed
miserably, he must be, really smart people like Oprah say so. They
even have bumper stickers that call him "the one", it must be true.

Please do buy all the GM stock you can afford, in fact if I were you,
I'd go take money out of your 401K account as leverage. As long as
you put it back in 60-90 days you can do this without paying any kind
of early withdrawal penalties. After that 60-90 days point there is a
pretty heavy penalty, but don't worry, you should have quadrupled your
investments by then. What's the worst that could happen, the
government has you covered, just like they the had hurricane Katrina
folks covered, so you should be rolling in $$$ before that 60-90 day
period kicks in.

It's a no brainer, Obama says so, if you can't count on a liberal
politician to lay out more corporate welfare who can you trust, right?

GO FOR IT, who cares about that $173B in liabilities is more then
double their $83B in assets, that's just silly balance sheet
mathematics, it's nothing compared to what can be accomplished via
politics and propaganda. That's how they sold the Iraq war and it
turned out great. What's the worst that could happen?

Who cares if they can't sell cars, who needs to sell cars when there
is always another welfare check coming. Obama may have to write some
more welfare checks, NO PROBLEM.

So by all means available to you, 401K, loan sharks, food stamps, just
BUY, BUY, BUY, go big or go home, what are you some kind of sissy?

Haha, I was having problem figuring out how the hell GM stock stay at $1+ something. Now that you mentioned it, there is a big crowd believing everything coming out of Obama's mouth, and if he says GM is gonna come out the the BK stronger, it must mean the stock will worth big bucks after the reorg.

Now it all makes sense.
 

Craig234

Lifer
May 1, 2006
38,548
350
126
Originally posted by: SagaLore
Originally posted by: Craig234
Typical right-wing approach, run the car into the ditch following ideology. When problems require real and creative solutions, only Democrats come up with them, it seems.

Republicans just bitch about how they violate their ideology, and create slippery slopes predicting doom if the Democrats get their way.

So, we should just not give GM the assistance that will have payoffs for our society, and instead let them go out of business during the crisis, and let the economy suffer.

More poverty the right-wing can easily explain away as long as their ideology is followed. When we had children dying in unsafe factories living in poverty, they could defend that.

Because they don't understand the tradeoffs between the options, they think the GM bailout is some precedent for broad socialism, when it's not.

And they don't understand the bastards on the right who put the nation second to a chance to strike a blow against the unions at GM in favor of the foreign car makers.

Holy democrat talking points!

If I remove all the bolded which is just sensationalism, there is nothing left. :Q

You're really an extremist ideologue.

Headline: "Obama administration massive investment to find cure for Polio succeeds! Eradicates Polio, no child will suffer from it again!"

Sagalore respose: "LOL! What Democrat talking points - take out the 'save the children' sensationalism and there's nothing to the story.

Of course you ideologue, it's about the bolded values. WE have some.
 

SagaLore

Elite Member
Dec 18, 2001
24,036
21
81
Originally posted by: Craig234
<snip>
Of course you ideologue, it's about the bolded values. WE have some.

Of course you do, because useless phrases aren't cool until you emphasize them. ;)
 

CycloWizard

Lifer
Sep 10, 2001
12,348
1
81
Originally posted by: Ktulu
I am absolutely confident that no matter what car you drive you are the type of person that carries a heavy bias against anything domestic. So what you say does not surprise me one bit.

http://www.edmunds.com/insidel...paros/articleId=124091
http://www.motortrend.com/road...nd_road_test_data.html
http://money.cnn.com/galleries...ibu_review//index.html

The Malibu might not win every comparo or have everything everyone wants but it's a damn good car and I'll take the word over pros in the industry over some biased individual online. The same goes for many other GM's and Fords.
So I take it you've not driven one? Or are you one of those people that doesn't notice blind spots the size of a semi because you don't bother to check them before changing lanes? I'm 6'4" and I couldn't even see over the trunk while trying to back up. The function of things like power windows and temperature control (which it didn't have... WTF?) were inferior to my 1990 Acura Integra. It didn't even have any cupholders. All of these were things I tried to use in my four-day stint with the car. So yes, based on my experience, I am biased against the Malibu.

My rental experiences always seem to be with American cars, so perhaps that's building an overall bias against them. But that would be because they are very poorly engineered. I have to ask myself if anyone tried to drive it before they built it. Or, if they had, if they had driven a comparable Toyota or Honda to see if their car passed muster. My 2008 Prius was the same price as the 2008 Malibu. I have a hard time believing anyone who was capable of making an objective choice between the two would ever choose the Malibu.

Now that I acknowledge your fallacious appeal to authority and click on your junk links, I see the following:
1ST PLACE: TOYOTA CAMRY SE V-6
Finest all-around mix of power, handling, room, and bells and whistles-no wonder it was our 2007 Car of the Year.

2ND PLACE: CHEVROLET MALIBU LTZ
Great combination of sport and luxury bettered only by Camry. America's best and segment's best-looking.
Hmm, imagine that - exactly what I said. Have YOU driven both of them? It sounds like you're one of those people who are biased against foreign cars.
 

Svnla

Lifer
Nov 10, 2003
17,986
1,388
126
Originally posted by: woodie1
Originally posted by: Ktulu
Originally posted by: Svnla
Originally posted by: Ktulu
Originally posted by: Svnla
Facts = GM in its glory days had a market share (in the US) of over 50%....as of right now, it has about 20% (give and take) market share. Look like the customers know what they want.

GM's market share did not simply shrink so bad because of their products, it's because people are scared to buy products from a company that they are afraid will not be around to support their warranties and mantainance. Why the hell do you think Ford has sales have been growing over the last month, people know their going to be around, not so sure about GM though.

GM went down (marketshare) steadily within the last 50 years. Their problems just didn't happen over night. Ford is up a bit but still has not up to its old glory days. Heck, I doubt that the big 3 will ever be.

Yeah, but there's also a shit load more competition from overseas than there was 50 years ago so it's almost expected.

And that competition is what caused the domestic companies to make a far better car than they would otherwise be building right now. Competition is what improves the product - any product - you either make it better with minimal price increases or your market share falls.

Amen, I was about to say the same thing. I understand about the market now has more competitors and much tougher but come on, from 50% plus to less than 1/2 of that and falling?
 

Robor

Elite Member
Oct 9, 1999
16,979
0
76
Originally posted by: SagaLore
Originally posted by: Craig234
Typical right-wing approach, run the car into the ditch following ideology. When problems require real and creative solutions, only Democrats come up with them, it seems.

Republicans just bitch about how they violate their ideology, and create slippery slopes predicting doom if the Democrats get their way.

So, we should just not give GM the assistance that will have payoffs for our society, and instead let them go out of business during the crisis, and let the economy suffer.

More poverty the right-wing can easily explain away as long as their ideology is followed. When we had children dying in unsafe factories living in poverty, they could defend that.

Because they don't understand the tradeoffs between the options, they think the GM bailout is some precedent for broad socialism, when it's not.

And they don't understand the bastards on the right who put the nation second to a chance to strike a blow against the unions at GM in favor of the foreign car makers.

Holy democrat talking points!

If I remove all the bolded which is just sensationalism, there is nothing left. :Q

Reality has a liberal bias ;)
 

Robor

Elite Member
Oct 9, 1999
16,979
0
76
Originally posted by: CycloWizard
Originally posted by: Ktulu
I am absolutely confident that no matter what car you drive you are the type of person that carries a heavy bias against anything domestic. So what you say does not surprise me one bit.

http://www.edmunds.com/insidel...paros/articleId=124091
http://www.motortrend.com/road...nd_road_test_data.html
http://money.cnn.com/galleries...ibu_review//index.html

The Malibu might not win every comparo or have everything everyone wants but it's a damn good car and I'll take the word over pros in the industry over some biased individual online. The same goes for many other GM's and Fords.
So I take it you've not driven one? Or are you one of those people that doesn't notice blind spots the size of a semi because you don't bother to check them before changing lanes? I'm 6'4" and I couldn't even see over the trunk while trying to back up. The function of things like power windows and temperature control (which it didn't have... WTF?) were inferior to my 1990 Acura Integra. It didn't even have any cupholders. All of these were things I tried to use in my four-day stint with the car. So yes, based on my experience, I am biased against the Malibu.

My rental experiences always seem to be with American cars, so perhaps that's building an overall bias against them. But that would be because they are very poorly engineered. I have to ask myself if anyone tried to drive it before they built it. Or, if they had, if they had driven a comparable Toyota or Honda to see if their car passed muster. My 2008 Prius was the same price as the 2008 Malibu. I have a hard time believing anyone who was capable of making an objective choice between the two would ever choose the Malibu.

Now that I acknowledge your fallacious appeal to authority and click on your junk links, I see the following:
1ST PLACE: TOYOTA CAMRY SE V-6
Finest all-around mix of power, handling, room, and bells and whistles-no wonder it was our 2007 Car of the Year.

2ND PLACE: CHEVROLET MALIBU LTZ
Great combination of sport and luxury bettered only by Camry. America's best and segment's best-looking.
Hmm, imagine that - exactly what I said. Have YOU driven both of them? It sounds like you're one of those people who are biased against foreign cars.

Re: Options/features... Are you comparing a stripped rental to a loaded personal car?
 

CycloWizard

Lifer
Sep 10, 2001
12,348
1
81
Originally posted by: Robor
Re: Options/features... Are you comparing a stripped rental to a loaded personal car?
No. I have the bottom-of-the-line Prius. I'm not exactly sure what package the rental was. The fundamental design flaws in the Malibu don't appear to be optional, however.
 

5150Joker

Diamond Member
Feb 6, 2002
5,549
0
71
www.techinferno.com
Originally posted by: woodie1
Originally posted by: 5150Joker
America..f-ya!!! Well America has been on a steady decline anyway so this was all but inevitable. Once other nations like China achieve military parity with the US, the glory days of waving the US flag around and bullying smaller nations will come to an end. A cool sight I saw today was someone with a big US flag waving from their Toyota Camry..simply beautiful. I'm sure the Japanese must be laughing their asses off.

Isn't Kentucky still one of the 50 States? Did Toyota close their Georgetown, KY, plant?


So what if they assemble cars in the US? Samsung asembles most of it's North American televisions in Mexico, does that make it a Mexican company? The money Toyota, Honda etc make all goes back to their shareholders and Japanese employees back home. But more to the point: Waving an American flag from an automobile designed by JAPANESE is hilarious! What are they so proud of? That a bunch of American grunts can assemble something? A monkey can do that. The brains behind the Toyota Camry (from which he so proudly waved his American flag) are located in Japan. Americans should be ashamed - a superpower that can't even compete against S. Korean cars anymore let alone Japanese and German (which are on an entirely different level).
 

Fern

Elite Member
Sep 30, 2003
26,907
174
106
Originally posted by: 5150Joker
Originally posted by: woodie1
Originally posted by: 5150Joker
America..f-ya!!! Well America has been on a steady decline anyway so this was all but inevitable. Once other nations like China achieve military parity with the US, the glory days of waving the US flag around and bullying smaller nations will come to an end. A cool sight I saw today was someone with a big US flag waving from their Toyota Camry..simply beautiful. I'm sure the Japanese must be laughing their asses off.

Isn't Kentucky still one of the 50 States? Did Toyota close their Georgetown, KY, plant?


So what if they assemble cars in the US? Samsung asembles most of it's North American televisions in Mexico, does that make it a Mexican company? The money Toyota, Honda etc make all goes back to their shareholders and Japanese employees back home. But more to the point: Waving an American flag from an automobile designed by JAPANESE is hilarious! What are they so proud of? That a bunch of American grunts can assemble something? A monkey can do that. The brains behind the Toyota Camry (from which he so proudly waved his American flag) are located in Japan. Americans should be ashamed - a superpower that can't even compete against S. Korean cars anymore let alone Japanese and German (which are on an entirely different level).

Toyota stock is sold on the NYSE. Not all shareholder are Japanese.

Not all Toyota employees are in Japan, they have a number of plants located around the USA.

The days when big internationals were 'American" or "Japanese" etc are long gone. Nobody knows who, from what country, owns these things etc. Back in the 80's it was often said by various finance scholars that almost all companies were ultimately owned by the Royal Dutch Petroleum Company (IIRC, now called Shell). For all we know, it or Ford, could be majority owned by Saudi money funneled through various funds and/or other holdings.

IDK how you can be so sure who works on the design teams and how they are all Japanese/non-Americans either.

Fern
 

Paddington

Senior member
Jun 26, 2006
538
0
0
At the end of the day, the biggest problem at GM remains their labor costs. The product is improved, and there's several I would consider. But in the auto industry, profit margins are fairly slim. GM's wage + benefit deficit means that they make no money on cars sold essentially. I mean no GM worker has been laid off in decades, despite several plants shuttered. Those people all went to the jobs bank where they collected 95% of their pay for several years, before eventually being bought out of their contracts - voluntarily - to the tune of $50,000 - $400,000 packages. People bitch and whine about CEO golden parachutes, but this was much worse because it was on such a huge scale.

Obama's plan does nothing to challenge the root cause of GM's problems, which is the ridiculous wage and benefit package of the employees. They still haven't taken as much of a "haircut" as they would have in a real bankruptcy court, or a real pre-bankruptcy settlement. They know Obama will take care of them, which he has. GM's biggest problem going into the future will still remain: overpaid grunts on the assembly line. In what kind of world can a monkey who cranks a wrench make $80,000+ in wages and benefits? Not the prosperous one of 5 years ago, and probably not the much tighter one we're heading into.
 

ayabe

Diamond Member
Aug 10, 2005
7,449
0
0
Ford and GM make the best trucks for what it's worth, the Japanese can't seem to figure that market out, so no one is perfect.

Getting more Camaro's out there would certainly help, having to bid on ebay way over MSRP in this economy is just nuts.
 

compuwiz1

Admin Emeritus Elite Member
Oct 9, 1999
27,112
930
126
Ford is gonna be laughing their asses off, as they are free to move about without government management and GM is not. :)

GM needs to focus on building tanks and other war machinery. ;)
 

ElFenix

Elite Member
Super Moderator
Mar 20, 2000
102,402
8,574
126
Originally posted by: CycloWizard
So I take it you've not driven one? Or are you one of those people that doesn't notice blind spots the size of a semi because you don't bother to check them before changing lanes? I'm 6'4" and I couldn't even see over the trunk while trying to back up. The function of things like power windows and temperature control (which it didn't have... WTF?) were inferior to my 1990 Acura Integra. It didn't even have any cupholders. All of these were things I tried to use in my four-day stint with the car. So yes, based on my experience, I am biased against the Malibu.

:confused:
 

Strk

Lifer
Nov 23, 2003
10,197
4
76
Originally posted by: Paddington
At the end of the day, the biggest problem at GM remains their labor costs. The product is improved, and there's several I would consider. But in the auto industry, profit margins are fairly slim. GM's wage + benefit deficit means that they make no money on cars sold essentially. I mean no GM worker has been laid off in decades, despite several plants shuttered. Those people all went to the jobs bank where they collected 95% of their pay for several years, before eventually being bought out of their contracts - voluntarily - to the tune of $50,000 - $400,000 packages. People bitch and whine about CEO golden parachutes, but this was much worse because it was on such a huge scale.

Obama's plan does nothing to challenge the root cause of GM's problems, which is the ridiculous wage and benefit package of the employees. They still haven't taken as much of a "haircut" as they would have in a real bankruptcy court, or a real pre-bankruptcy settlement. They know Obama will take care of them, which he has. GM's biggest problem going into the future will still remain: overpaid grunts on the assembly line. In what kind of world can a monkey who cranks a wrench make $80,000+ in wages and benefits? Not the prosperous one of 5 years ago, and probably not the much tighter one we're heading into.

Don't get me wrong, the labors costs are high, but saying that's the biggest problem is ignoring a lot. Yes, their line is getting pretty competitive now, but it still needs work and almost every refresh that has improved their line is only a year or two old. Their new compact still isn't out. The subcompact is still waiting on an ETA. A lot of their SUVs are still waiting refreshes and/or still a few months away. Before that, truly competitive cars were few and far between. And that's not forgetting about their overabundance of dealers, competing with themselves (I.e. rebadging), bland styling and insistence on cheap materials and poor quality control.

They aren't like Ford. Ford has refreshed/redesigned their entire line. They're only adding to it now (Fiesta should be next, and possibly the Ka).

Originally posted by: ElFenix
Originally posted by: CycloWizard
So I take it you've not driven one? Or are you one of those people that doesn't notice blind spots the size of a semi because you don't bother to check them before changing lanes? I'm 6'4" and I couldn't even see over the trunk while trying to back up. The function of things like power windows and temperature control (which it didn't have... WTF?) were inferior to my 1990 Acura Integra. It didn't even have any cupholders. All of these were things I tried to use in my four-day stint with the car. So yes, based on my experience, I am biased against the Malibu.

:confused:

Either they were hidden, or that's just one more thing that was stripped for fleet sales. It could be a new method to help improve resale, while still maintaining the sales. Fleet cars were usually stripped down, but usually to the lowest trim level, minus a bit more. Maybe now they're making it so that even the lowest trim level is still pretty well equipped compared to the fleet car.
 

Chunkee

Lifer
Jul 28, 2002
10,391
1
81
i would love an Avalanche LTZ....but it costs 48-54 grand....buy it, next year worth 25-30 grand....

why are their vehicles so much money?