Comments on: On the Sorry State of General Motors

By: cine

cine — Mon, 04 May 2009 17:26:00 +0000

Why not export trucks to poor countries like India , Srilanka and Pakistan though these countries have cheaper versions but still exports would help them ease debt’s a bit

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 17:54:00 +0000

Richard requests one day a week for good news.

Well Richard, good news is called "PR" and we already get plenty of it from companies in all kinds of financial conditions.

News, however, can be defined as anything people in power DON'T want you to know. Hence the "bad" tinge to it.

You want "good" news, go to the press releases; you want "news" news, go elsewhere.

By: dearieme

dearieme — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 18:12:00 +0000

Anyone British will recognise the picture with a sad shake of the head. Our native car industry followed this pattern a generation earlier. Our car factories produce lots of vehicles nowadays -for Toyota, Honda, Nissan and so on. The shareholders of the old British companies lost badly, and so did the taxpayers who funded various half-witted attempts at “rescue”. You should at least have the wisdom to spare yourselves that, chaps.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 12:55:00 +0000

For Richard B

Last night I had dinner with the president of a 50 employee company that manufactures hi tech nozzles for coating of highly specialized medical instruments and similarly demanding stuff from other industries.

He told me his company is going gangbusters!

By: David

David — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 06:13:00 +0000

I took some criticism at RealMoney.com for writing things like this about GM, though the author here was a much better writer.

The thing is, there are enough levers here that GM can keep the debt ball in the air for some time, as can many of the financial guarantors, so long as they can make their interest payments.

The “Big 3″ lose vitality vs. Toyota and Honda each year — in the long run GM and Ford don’t make it. Perhaps after they go through bankruptcy, and shed liabilities to the PBGC, and issue new equity to the current unsecured bondholders, they can exist as smaller companies that have focus. Maybe Ford could be a division of Magna, and GM a division of Johnson Controls. At least then there would be competent management.

By: Yves Smith

Yves Smith — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 06:04:00 +0000

Hey, if you think it's a downer reading this blog, remember I have to read the news closely!

I don't know if I can find that much cheery news. I usually put in animal stories when I find them, and I also am putting up funny videos too to provide a little relief. Will look harder for the animal stories, I have been falling down on that front of late.

Felix Salmon is more upbeat by temperament than I am. If you don't know him already, you might check him out.

By: Richard B

Richard B — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 05:52:00 +0000

How about dedicating one day a week to good news. Surely someone out there is doing something right.

By: Yves Smith

Yves Smith — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 05:30:00 +0000

Agreed.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 04:59:00 +0000

This is a brilliant piece of writing, and could easily be said of the U.S.A.