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Automotive News & Views Ford Profitable by 2010?
239 messages, Last post on Nov 02, 2009 at 6:14 AM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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Replying to: colloquor (Oct 09, 2009 6:55 am) I don't like the middle of the market; these $30K appliances. If I had to pick 2 Ford's to put in my garage I'd pick a - Ford Fiesta that doesn't cost much to run and gets great mpg, and a Shelby GT500 for fun. A Fusion, Taurus, their crossovers don't do anything for me style-wise, will cost lots in depreciation, and do many things fairly well but don't do anything very well (unless you really need to haul people and things). |
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"Ford achieved a 10.1-percent market share in September in its primary 19 European markets - the best share for any month since September 2001 - and a 0.8 percentage point increase on September 2008." Ford's Europe Share Hits 10 Percent (AutoObserver) 
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Replying to: steve_ (Oct 14, 2009 8:29 pm) If Ford continues to post $ losses then they will end up in the same situation as GM and Chrysler - needing long-term government support to saty anywhere near their current operational size. When do you think we'll see Ford post some quarterly profits?
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Replying to: kernick (Oct 15, 2009 8:56 am) Don't have the link handy but one of the autoblogs is running a story about how people are unhappy with subcompacts and want to go back to bigger sedans and SUVs ("cheap" gas helps). That could hurt the Fiesta if people decide it's too small.
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Replying to: steve_ (Oct 15, 2009 9:16 am) I've been around the corporate world long enough to know that if the upper level executives want to be around, they have to have a plan that says they are going to be successful. Get it? If they say they think the reality is that the company has a 25% chance of surviving based on trends, then they are gone tomorrow. They would be replaced by a group who would put together their "highly likely turnaround" plan based on optimistic projections, and would predict profits. If you go back and look at GM's execs late last year, note how optimistic they were that they would turnaround the GM. Wasn't it "Bankruptcy is not an Option"? just a few months before it happened? You can go to any corporate website and watch any interview of any corporate executive and you will see a positive future being promoted; sometimes while they are dumping their stock and looking for their next job. It's not much different then a politician who sees the polls 2:1 against them, who campaigns hard and predicts the day of the election that they see victory at hand. These "leaders" know they can't admit how dark their goal appears.
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Replying to: kernick (Oct 15, 2009 3:55 pm) Ford 3Q Profit Possible, JP Morgan Says (AutoObserver) (No one else agrees with JP Morgan though).
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Replying to: steve_ (Oct 15, 2009 9:16 am) So people will still be downsizing their automotive aspirations, whether they like it or not. There will be a market for a GOOD subcompact. Whether the Fiesta is a success or failure depends on how good it is - the European version appears to be great - and Ford's expectations. If Ford expects to sell 300,000 a year, it will be disappointed. For the record, I drove a white five-door hatchback Fiesta at this summer's Carlisle All-Ford Nationals, and was impressed. It definitely would be a good pick for a commuter car or a car for a college student. It looked and drove like the people who designed and built it really cared (think the Honda Fit, or even the Civic), as opposed to an effort that was phoned in by engineers and managers who would rather be designing Cadillacs or big trucks (think GM small cars). |
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Replying to: steve_ (Oct 21, 2009 6:29 am) So if Ford or other automakers don't make profit in the 3rd quarter, then they had better have some significant improvements in 4th quarter and 2010 to expect a profit. I don't see that happening, as wage increases are negligible and unemployment continues to increase, and rising foreclosures contuinue to dampen the most valuable asset people have - the value of their home. Every automaker had better come up with a plan that accounts for an automarket in the U.S. of 10M vehicles, and get their costs and size of operations set for that, such that they make a profit there.
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Replying to: kernick (Oct 21, 2009 9:17 am) |
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and a pretty good one even excluding special items and with falling revenues at Ford Credit. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/03/business/03auto.html http://media.ford.com/article_display.cfm?article_id=31244 |
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