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GM Continues To Stuff Dealers With Its Cars
GM just reported its December sales numbers to a reaction that led all women in Phil LeBeau's presence to order what he is having. The uberbullish take home message from the report: "General Motors dealers reported 223,932 total sales in December, a
16-percent increase from a year ago for the company’s four brands. The
gain was driven by solid retail sales which were 27 percent higher than a
strong December a year ago. For the calendar year, total sales for GM’s
four brands increased 21 percent to 2,202,927, while retail sales rose
16 percent for the year. GM’s four brands sold 118,435 more vehicles
this year than the company did with eight brands in 2009, and will gain
total and retail market share for the year." And on the surface this is pretty: after all the comparison is between a number of 193,824 from a year ago, and 223,932 as of December. But shouldn't the comparison actually be between 385,000 and 511,000? These are the numbers that show what GM's dealer inventory was for the months of December 2009 and 2010. In other words, there was an increase of 30k in sales... accompanied by a 125k increase in "stuffed" vehicles held at dealers. Does anyone still have that AOL case study handy somewhere?
Note the hockeystick in dealer stuffing in the past year.
And speaking of GM, here are some valuation observations courtesy of reader J.P.
I attached the Citi Initiation on GM, which is quite funny as the adjustments for cash, pension and tax benefits account for more than 1/2 the value of the stock........not to mention valuing the auto ops at a hugely inflated 4.5x 2013 EBITDAP..............and the dirty secret that GM is currently reporting PENSION INCOME while paying out $6-$9 bn per year in CASH PENSION EXPENSES.........oh, and with a $100 bn pension, that is equivalent to nearly 1/10th of the entire S&P 500 Pension liabilities despite having a market cap of $50-$60bn.
GM Valuation:
So that's reality. And here is propaganda:
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But GS and RBC this morning initiated coverage with $42+ price targets. Surely the sell side is never wrong?
Few things as reliable a sell as a Big Broker Buy Report,
especially if it's glossy or multimedia
For the *4 BRANDS*.. talk about a bunch of BS HYPE. Here's the facts:
DEC 2010
Ford Motor Co. 190,191 units a 4% increase YOY
Govt. Motors 224,147 unites an 8% increase YOY
FY 2010
Ford Motor Co. 1,964,059 units a 17% increase
Govt. Motors 2,211,699 units a 7% increase
THAT'S WITH ALL THAT FREE TARP MONEY THAT GM TOOK ALONG WITH ALL IT'S DEBT GONE, A FRESH NEW CREDIT COMPANY ALLY THAT CAN GET $$$ ALOT CHEAPER THAN FORD CREDIT WHO HAS TO CRAWL ANOTHER 4 LEVELS UP TO GET OUT OF JUNK STATUS.
Never mind Ford didn't take bailout money. And don't give me this yes they did - no the took the energy loans that only VIABLE companies could GET for green initiatives.
So now GM is all wonderful hyped etc. while Ford still has to crawl through SH&T to get a good credit rating while not BUTF*CKING THEIR bondholders and stockholders like GM did.
What a ponzi scheme everything is nowadays. Numbers? They mean nothing unless you dedicate your life and resources to finding the truth. There is no truth anywhere, and if there were I would certainly not recognize it.
Anyone have a sense of what portion of sales was related to the military? That seems to be their biggest customer on a $$ per car basis. I hear if they get a flat tire or stop running while there out killing, maiming and raping the villagers, they set'em on fire.
The government numbers sure would be interesting.
I bought a year old Dakota in great shape from a government auction verified in Carfax and the dealers lots in town were full of identical models.
Are there any honest corporations left in American any more?
Not GM, after advertising magic $199 a month payments that don't exist
They do $199/month, but if it's a purchase its over 84 month term plus $6,000 down, if it's a lease it's with $4,000 down and under 1k miles per month allowance.
Read the fine print; it'll freak you out!
GM is still and will always be UAW/Obama Motors. They cheated bondholders and taxpayers.
Taxpayers - YES!
Bondholders - NO!
http://epicureandealmaker.blogspot.com/2009/05/more-of-kickin-sitcheyation.html
I have to ask... has there ever been a single one???
Market seems to need more Thorazine and a round of electroshock, as it appears to be crashing into depression on this news instead of ear to ear grin mania. What, are you not amused Mr Market?
This will surely drive gold to unprecedented heights.
Sarcasm as gold was down 42.10?
Margin calls beaches!
A fool and his money are soon parted.
Are you picking on Carlos Slim and his gold play again?
You mean silver?
yeah, silver
Heigh o
oh oh
You do know that he hasn't bought yet, so this downturn is in his favor, right?
Go all in DZZ and call us back next month from your local library.
Prefer using futures. More leverage, but then since you're at the library now look it up and check it out.
Whatever you do, go all in short on giant leverage. You will be the one getting crushed.
You're just a typical screeching troll.
Amazing really. The criminal syndicate known as Wall Street, and all of its various players like analysts, still have not made the leap to the Internet, apparently. They still live in a fantasy world where they send out a controlled and manipulated message and expect Average Joe to buy it.
I wonder how many more months of this BS being expertly revealed here on ZH [and other places on the Web] before these hockey helmet wearing morons finally get it? Calling Scott Redler...how is confidence coming along this morning? Mr. Redler, this is a "helmet on" day.
Ron White was prophetic..."There ain't no cure for stupid."
The public is long gone, net sellers of securities, or at least funds, for 33 months running. I don't know who is buying this junk.
I wonder who supplied the steel for those new cars coming online or the mining and farming equipment being mass produced in the USA ? Jim Rogers talks about farming and commodities bull run.... 20 years.
CAT,JOYG,BUCY,X
US Steel will break its all time high in the next 2 years. Cat will hit $140-$160.
That's nice. And what will a dollar be worth in 2 years?
Don't waste your time. In Spalding's universe, you can keep running perpetual deficits, and finance it through outright debt monetization, forever.
Sounds like the typical American household.
88'
Perhaps, but gold will be trading at $6,000+.
Palladium is vastly outperforming gold. Uptrend remains intact. Further proof of the ongoing boom in new car buying? Or maybe jewelry? Who knows?
Still no sign of the parts suppliers breaking down yet. AZO cracking today, but TRW, Ford, etc. still strong.
You should buy some before it's too late.
But that would require intuition.
If you haven't figured out yet, he is a troll. He has no money, is probably from California, and has some shitty bureaucratic job at the DMV.
RobotTrader = Leo Kolivakis.
no... not ....california.
Not sure what part of "sales were up" ZH doesn't seem to understand. Also, with Factory Orders revised higher last month (was that mentioned here) and beating this month, we see yet more signs of economic growth.
But of course none of these positive numbers we're seeing matter in the bizzarro world of ZH.
If you read the article you won't seem so clueless.
I did. The point is, they sold more cars. Period. That's good news.
We closed the books yesterday on 2010 - best Q4 in company history. But of course, none of this matters because I'm sure even though we had our best sales, we probably were stuffing the channels with inventory as well. Oh, we weren't? Never mind.
Not sure what part of "channel stuffing" you don't understand. But I see you are just interested in the headlines.
You are Nassim's Thanksgiving turkey, Harry. Thanksgiving day approaches...
Have you ever heard of the term "crack up boom", if not google it!
Hank--when you say "we" does that mean you are with GM, which would explain your perspective.
this also makes GM's P&L look good from an overhead absorption perspective--more cars built, more overhead absorbed. And gm gets to sell those unwanted cars, to boot.
its gonna be interesting to see production and sales and inventory building in 1q11. Watch for layoffs, if the govt allows layoffs of GM employees.
BTW--does the labor freeze for govt employees extend to the employees at GM?
Stuffing the channel on lots is not more cars sold, brainiac.
Oh BTW you dont have a company, thats been established here Harry Dreamer.
"We closed the books yesterday on 2010 - best Q4 in company history."
Who is "we?" Goobermint/Obama/UAW Motors? Your message parlor? Loan sharking?
Wanger sells urinal cakes.
zh is his message parlor.
36,000 new actual sales is not what I would consider a euphoria inducing figure when you consider a few things:
1)Over a trillion dollars freshly printed cash
2) 30,000 increase out of a population of 300 million citizens is about 0.012% of the population. Of these sales how many would you wager are students/kids with a young credit history who will inevitably turn into defaulters along with their student loans?
3) Since these "Sales" or (1000 bucks down in exchange for keys and 20k in debt as I like to call it) are what arrived GM at their funeral with these same tactics did not prevent the company from going BK when they were "selling" 5 million cars annually in 2004-5 range why on Earth after unprecedented governmental interventions would you conclude that 3 million cars a year would lead to sustainable and profitable business in a unsustainable debt and monetary stimulus environment.
Especially when input costs are rising along with oil prices.We have a glut of automobiles and housing.
We are in the matrix. The creation of the illusion of normalcy with pretend jobs, pretend prosperity by the government.
The Frame may say United States of America and have a beautiful Red, White and Blue paint job but under the hood there is no engine because there is no productivity, no manufacturing and more importantly ZERO responsibility to course correct while we still stood a chance. Just like Schiff said in 2008 when the world was ending, " They are going to once again attempt to repair the economy with the same poisions that arrived us at this position but only on a grander scale"
So how does GM go hat in hand this time? Well The important thing is that the precedent was already set in all sectors in 2008. That my friends is socialism.
the handling of the auto industry does look, at least superficially, like a kind of "crony socialism".
but the far greater scale of the bailout of the financial sector is clearly crony capitalism where the arbitrarily distributed government largesse went straight to the least deserving: management, bondholders and stockholders of the worst run (because insolvent) of the financial sector. and the exceptions that prove the rule (that it is the cronies that get the goodies, not even just all the "deserving incompetents") are bear stearns and lehman brothers.
HarryWanker is now a big fan of the Gooberment Motors Corp!! Yowza!
Someone ask the Harry what part of the words "the market is rigged" he doesn't understand..
Someone ask Homer why every bit of economic news from claims to manufacturing to factory orders have all been pretty damn strong?
Someone ask Homer whey the ECRI Leading Index that was posted here for weeks as the "coming of the Apocalypse", is now a POSITIVE 2.2%? Does that get mentioned here any longer? Does any good news get mentioned here? Or does good news get merely spun into something negative?
Keep following that line of thinking and you will lose your money more quickly than you already probably have.
As soon as $4 trillion in fiscal and monetary stimuli in the US economy are not removed, but merely stop being injected, and there is actual organic improvement in the economy, you will be the first to know. As this will not happen for the next decade, you may consider other venues more suitable to your confirmation bias. In the meantime, and courtesy of ongoing fiat devaluation, if you had shorted gold and gone long stocks in 2010 you would be down 15%. Which is also how much you are down in real terms if you only went long stocks.
Exactly.
'Organic growth' is a beautiful thing, because it's of lasting duration, and we could have set the table for it had the nanny state Keynesian madmen not conducted their massive missive in interfering with markets (while enriching their friends in a way not seen...well...ever before. Thanks Hank Paulson, thank you George W. Bush, thank you ObaMao, thanks Brian Sacks!).
Now, the malinvestment, mark-to-fairy tale valuations on everything from MBS to share values, the taxation otherwise known as speculative commodity chasing (thanks to Bernanke's insane ZIRP experiment), and many more malignant knock-on effects of the mad policies will doom the economy for years.
Gold is flat vs mid October
robo's fantasies are flat nipple vs. nipple. it's when you compare nipples vs. ribcage that the difference is noted.
After China slows & revalues 20% w/rate hikes = trade balance. USA = Bull run = QE 3 will not be an issue with 4.0 GDP. State revenue is getting better ... USA going on 10 year run.
China slowdown will also bring commodities down, helping uncle ben.
What if you bought crox or amzn or sprd?
Right, because the price of all imports spiking is good for commerce in the short term, and the relative strengthening of the Renminbi, and hence the Dollar dropping, which translates into more expensive fuel is also strongly bullish.
Oh, and good luck getting the American worker to trivially accept those shitty jobs which were sent abroad.
The cheap junk will be built in Africa or Mexico or ? Many businesses inside the USA love a cheap dollar. And look at a ten year chart of the dollar after 07' and QE 2 ??? 80' really not that bad starting 2011.
The slowdown will help keep oil in check. You will start to see investment in the USA manufacturing as China transforms into a consumer driven economy. This will take a few years but China will revalue big starting in 2011.
Yes, because as China slows, it will want to revalue up so that it can cut it's exports even further and create more unemployment in a country having difficulty feeding itself. Nothing promotes domestic peace like unemployment and hunger. Those 3 million engineers being graduated every year with no jobs, in a world economy that is incapable of absorbing that many engineers will be really happy too.
The USA bull run, of course, will be the result of our expansion in manufacturing, electronics, patents and other goods that we're going to produce from money dumped into Primary dealers, bank recapitalization programs and arbitrage- because the banks ALWAYS share their wealth with the little people.
Of course, 4% GDP derived from government and public spending (read DEBT) rather than private spending, production and investment is a sure winner- and good for additional inflated dollars in value on equities and bond payments before that haircut shears your wealth into the bin from all the other sheep.
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
You do realize that with a stronger currency, they will be able to import food from abroad, right?
Where did you think our hyperinflation was going to come from? The sky?
They won't revalue up that much- it would kill their exports- therefore, the currency will not be stronger.
As hyperinflation is a faith in currency event- I don't understand your point.
I currently have no faith in our currency.
important distinction. inflation (cost push or demand pull) and hyperinflation are different phenomena.
Actually, all that info is posted here Harry. I am well aware of the improvement in the statistics made available by government and different reporting companies. Now, comes the hard part: analysis. You seem to be incapable of performing analysis as you are ignorant of assimilation and the power of putting multiple streams of information together.
GM sales are up! , but their dealer sales are not. This number was generated by "stuffing the dealers lots". If you would read further, you would see this.
The numbers are better, but in inflated dollars from QE. This means, even though the price paid is higher, the profit is not. We work for profit, not higher prices.
Isn't the survey done yet?
but their dealer sales are not. This number was generated by "stuffing the dealers lots...
Sorry Sean, but this is not accurate.
Sales reported by GM are cars sold off the dealer lot, rolling down the street. Not GM sales to their dealers.
The premise of this entire article is wrong.
Wow - finally some sanity here! Yes, it's about auto SOLD. That's the strong number.
Oh good news. Obamas approval rating magically raises above 50 percent.
Because I SAID SO. Go go magical yascrew.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_theticket/obamas-job-approval-hits-50-perc...
It's a fucking miracle hallalolya!!!
Acme government. Manufacturing consent by manufacturing lying ass screws, nuts and bolts. Get your shipment today.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vgQalXaIxs
2nd worse yoy sales in the last 19 years. Very strong indeed. Daily Finance is also reporting that GM paid slightly more than $3200 in incentives per vehicle.
Nope, sorry you are wrong. Former GM insider.
Then you must have been an insider in the 1950's, or perhaps you attached mufflers to cars on the assembly line and have no idea how their books are calculated.
It is an absolute FACT that GM only reports a sale when the dealer reports the customer to GM.
The only unfair representation in today's numbers by GM is that they stuffed three extra days of sales into the December ledger. Sales for December (as GM reports it) closed Monday night 1/3/11 at 9pm. Three days may seem insignificant, but if you add up how many cars are sold per day, then it's actually significant.
Dude, GM insider in Corporate Finance for several years up until just prior to the BK. I know what the fuck I'm talking about. Revenue is booked at the time of delivery to the dealer lots. I wrote the fucking financial statements!
Book your revenue whenever the FUCK you want - maybe that's one reason why you guys went fucking bankrupt.
Booking your revenue has absolutely NOTHING to do with when a car is reported sold in monthly sales figures. The reason you're booking revenue when the vehicle hits the dealer lot is because that's when GMAC begins it's floor plan on it. Booking revenue does not equal a reported sale, except on your cooked books.
It is highly alarming that you cannot distinguish the difference, and yet you claim to have been an insider in corporate finance there.
Laughable!
Edit in: It is a universally accepted standard that all sales reported by car manufacturers at month-end are sales that are attached to a specific buyer, not just inventory waiting on a lot. If you book revenue at GM when the rental car company pays you for their 1000 cars, or when dealers pay you directly, or when the GMAC dealer floor-plan division pays you on behalf of a dealer is an entirely different issue. Book revenue whenever you want - that has no bearing on today's sales figures by all manufacturers.
Follow this link. Once on the front page, click on US Sales Reporting Calendar. You will see sales for the month of December closed on Monday January 3. Everything regarding vehicle sales is contingent on number of selling days, as the chart demonstrates.
http://www.motorintelligence.com/m_frameset.html
Do you think those 18 wheelers carrying 12 cars are treated like Domino delivery trucks, racing to various dealerships to dump more cars on the lot before midnight? Why do you think that many of the selling incentives (rebates, special interest rates) ended on January 3rd?
A sold vehicle is a vehicle that has a customer attached to it. Period. And that is a universally accepted method when manufacturers report month-end numbers.
Now, the more interesting question... how is it possible that a GM corporate insider who "wrote the financial statements" could be totally unaware of how many cars his company is selling, and how it's tallied? And why do the internal controls at GM book revenue before it truly exists? I'm sure there were all sorts of shenanigans going on with regard to "revenue booked." These would be interesting questions for someone, especially since our tax dollars saved their fucking ass.
I would think the cars should be considered consigned goods and only count as revenue once the dealer actually transfers title to a customer but I am not an accountant by trade. The real issue brewing is the increase in cars on lots since as we know from history if those do not sell quickly rebates will be in full force once again.
How are sales calculated? Cash vs accrual accounting? Is inventory marked to market? Got any information about that?
In fact, since you can assure us the basis of the entire article is wrong, then you must have cold, hard, factual articles disproving it. Please be so kind to provide these links to back up your assumptions.
Then perhaps you can reconcile these reports: The report here saying 27% higher than last Dec and 21% YOY and the AP report saying 7.5% in Dec and 6.3% YOY and Forbes reporting 16% in December sales.
I would suggest that the numbers are cooked. Unless you can show some collaborative evidence, we have no idea. The article details the stuffing of dealer inventories which could be finding there way into the numbers.
I have so far found three different numbers for total sales as well, ranging from the 2,202927 number up to 2,211,000. Since we are dependent on GM for the numbers and the numbers are all over the place, it wouldn't bet the farm on these numbers.
Auto manufacturers report two different types of sales: total sales and retail sales (dealer sales). Total sales are obvious. Retail sales are off dealer lots only, to real Joe and Jane Public - meaning not sales to fleet organizations like rental car companies that buy 10's of thousands of cars a year, or to federal and state government organizations or to corporations like GE (all those Volts they recently bought) all of whom buy directly from the GM factory for massive discounts.
Here's how it works:
1. GM ships vehicle to dealer
2. Dealer has an alloted time to sell that vehicle before they actually have to pay GM for it. Sometimes GM's floor plan agreements allow dealers to keep some vehicles on the lot, interest free - depending on how many cars they've been jammed with. This is a scratch my back/scratch your back relationship with GM and their dealers.
3. After a certain time frame, the dealer must pay GM for the car or begin paying interest on it
4. Dealer inventories can often approach $10 million, so there is a huge incentive to sell the car rather than paying interest on inventory or being forced to buy unsold inventory.
5. This leads to the high-pressure experience at many dealerships.
6. Vehicle is sold to a customer. Dealer must pay GM for car. GM reports a car sold.
Thanks for the clarification.
I'm having a hard time finding an accurate number, it is not off the dealers lot. It is the combination of dealer's lot, fleet sales, government sales and rental units. I will concede some of your point- my bad.
Harry fails to talk of the 'good news' that even with record amounts of government funny money being injected into our shell of a economy, they couldn't get annual car sales over 12 million, when auto sales numbered 17 million in 2006.
Like TD said, not only will withdrawing liquidity crush the economy, but at this point, failing to keep the lethal heroin flowing will expose that the economy is structurally hollowed out.
Bernanke is racing the clock to see if he can kick the can far enough down the street to allow a softer landing than what is probably going to be a hard crash at an untimely point despite his best efforts (because his methodology is literally insane).
When it's revealed that China really does have to quit subsidizing their consumers and businesses because of raging inflation and massively devalued loan paper 'over there,' that's when you'll see auto sales do the true swan dive (and let's not forget that Chinese auto sales are centered around a much lower price point per unit than in Europe or the U.S.).
Welcome to ZH, where stocks are only allowed to go down and manufacturing isn't allowed to exist in America, lest the peanut gallery run out of something to bitch about. Get yourself a glass of coolaid and have a seat. Clearly you're in the presence of true pipe-swinging monsters killing it by being tits-out leveraged and short as fuck since 2009.
What the fuck did you say?
We have enough fucktards on here trying to be clever beyond their ability. I'll add your name to the list.
Why the fuck are you here then? Fuck off back to Marketwatch, where every headline is a happy headline.
nopat = big fucking douche
Harry back for another beatdown directly from Tyler himself.
Shut up and pay for some banks troubled assets. You shouldn't have bragged about your BMW. They'll come get it as it become more and more apparent that nobodies going to pay the fucking bill.
People gonna get seditious, people gonna get vicious. You've sewed fuck off fruit and that's going to be your harvest. Get some it's bitter as hell and delicious.
I cast my bitchez in palladium. All of them. They keep longer. And I have a lot of bitchez!!! Dats why palladium is going up.
I'm sure this build up is just part of some planned cash for clunkers program they are sitting on for now.
Undoubtedly pipeline BS that was entrained prior to the IPO in order to decieve the investors, the voters, the liberal political base and the MSM. All it took was the ruination of the non-union creditors.
Supplyside mania.
I saw it 3 years ago, called it, pitched it, slapped people in the face with it...same message...same "vehicle" for my message too...
This created in June 2008 from a thought process penned down in mid-2006...
http://squareandc.net/Auto%20for%20Website.html
ORI
GM. America's glorious answer to Soviet Tractor Factory Number 4.
So what is a 'normal' inventory level?
With improvements in inventory management it should be 250k? 400k?
What was it 2000-2008?
Let's not confuse the message to the sheeple with facts!
GM is doing great..rah, rah, rah, pomp, pomp..
Just so I follow . . . I am looking at the chart an noticing a significant increase in inventory over the past year. I am thinking this is because GM now has to sell double the amount of cars out of 4 brands to make up for all of the brands lost brands after reorganization? I guess I don't understand why GM is 'stuffing' it's dealers?
Just a grad student trying to learn. Thanks in advance.
Keeps the factories running, people employed, and the green shoot myth alive. The more suspicious among us may insert political motives in here as well; after all, the saving of GM is an Obama victory....
If you're a grad student you might want to research Chrysler in 1979. Dealers were flooded with useless cars that ultimately sold for 50% of MSRP (and ran for 33% of the lifespan of a Toyota.)
Great post. Well done.
+1
May I also remind anyone doubting this as history repeating of; the line if credit extended to Chrysler. The name of the game is bailout, err or loan.... guess it depends on your definition.
The difference is now the interest rate environment.
There is a long tradition in the auto industry, of bad management keeping the assembly lines running even though sales are down. Henry Ford made this mistake, once, in the early twenties and it nearly killed him. Chrysler called it "Sales Bank" in the late seventies and it nearly killed them. One of the most experienced managers in the auto industry, Joseph Frazer, said " I never make a car unless I have a firm order for it. This year we have to retrench". His boss Henry Kaiser said " A Kaiser never retrenches! This year we will build as many cars as last year!". He soon had thousands of cars parked in fields around Detroit getting all weathered and shopworn. That decision nearly killed the Kaiser-Frazer company.
It is articles like this one that make me truly love ZH. I have been reading ZH for over a year now and it has taken me a long time to admit to myself that the system is totally rigged. After countless headline debunking articles by Tyler and friends I've finally reached the conclusion that the world is truly screwed. Wash, rinse, repeat....
Robo ...http://www.gizmag.com/japanese-scientist-artificial-palladium/17438/
might not be relevant going forward,..GM..as goes the american dream, so goes the American automobile..
"STUFF EM IF YOU GOT EM"...isnt that the old saying? lol...or smoke em if you got em?
The govt owns GM. Our communist government owns the fucking Piece of shit.
Shit in...shit out.
I love the GM ad's about the nutcracker truck...nice looking truck..IF GAS WAS A BUCK A GALLON!
You should consider the transfer of vehicles to GM rental car firms - for example, there are over 200 brand new Suburban/Tahoe SUV's parked at the Eagle/Vail Colorado airport right now. Doesn't GM own Hertz?
Ford owned Hertz but spun it off (I think) retaining a majority stake.
Ford sold Hertz to that incredibly well run and well capitalized firm that also owns (or used to own) Sheraton Hotels...
...and a disaster was born.
Oh, and there was a massive investment fraud being run by the head of the company, also.
A HEARTY thank you and hats off to the entire staff on this wonderful site. It proves not only that we want to know the truth but WE HAVE TO HANDLE the truth. Masking it just adding insult to injury. Funny, I see this sarcastic truth seeping into more mainstream media...like WSJ, the Trib (chicago)...something is better than nothing...
As Phish says...."the noose is hanging so at least you won't die wondering!"
GM kept sending me $2k off offers, supposedly since i have their "GM credit card" that i've not used in 9 years. The last one was yeasterday, but it was for... $3k! Make of it what you wish, the last offer liek this one came 2 years ago, right before GM was about to hit the fan.
$1,500 cashback, 0% interest loans, and no payments till spring ad campaign is in full swing. Obama Motors hasn't changed a thing.
http://www.gm.com/vehicles/currentoffers/
At Ally Bank, we believe it is possible.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgdTymCZowU"
Yes, you read that right. A $7,000 value when you finance with Ally Bank.
http://www.gmc.com/currentoffers/index.jsp?site=retail&evar24=gm_gm_com_off_gmc_SpringSavings
Fucking GM twats will be begging for more money in no time.
Why would it change? They were all bailed out.
It's like giving a heroin addict money for one last hit before they take themselves into rehab.
You know, if it ultimately plays out like that - the bailed out operations cutting their actual risk exposure - then I'm Napoleon Dynamite.
Maybe the government can buy millions of cars from GM on the sly, and then park them in a desert, somewhere, storing them, as they did with so many fighter jets and other aircraft.
That would be:
Cash for Clunkers II
I wish someone would put together this information for all the auto companys.
Pardon my profound ignorance, but seeing as the stats do suggest an increase of sales YOY, I'm not sure yet how the increase in inventories reveals the darker truth. Which is to say, could someone spell it out for us ignorant types that have trouble reading between the lines? Or knowing which shell the peanut is under (when it's actually already off the table and not under any of them just like in NY!)?
Someone pointed out that some of these vehicle sales may actually be transferances to other entities like Hertz rent a car. This makes perfect sense. Sales are up by slight of hand?
So can someone really break it down for me? Because right now I'm still scratching my head thinking GM actually sold more cars December than they did last year.
Dealers, for whatever reason (take whatever cue you want based on surreal events of late in government and finance and all things Wall Street), have bought a massive amount of cars from GM - end consumers have not - giving GM a beat over last year's sales.
From what I've been told, 60 days' inventory is considered good dealership practice. What this 'stuffing' of GM cars does to dealership inventory levels, I do not know yet.
And you raise a good point about fleet sales to rental agencies. I might suggest someone look into fleet sales of GM (and Chrysler and Ford) vehicles to our ever-growing federal and state levels of government, too.
GM forces the dealers to take the inventory--gm floor plans the financing and who knows what else. If the dealer does not take the invenory or trys not to, the next time dealers are cut out of the picture , guess who goes.
Yep, accurate! You will buy, we have our ways.
Almost right. I worked for years as a Finance Manager in a GM dealership, as well as Ford, Crysler, and Honda. They cannot force you to do anything that is not expressly spelled out in the dealer agreement. However, the district rep gives you a quota and a "recommended" number of cars to buy. Many times they give you the dealer extra free floor plan time (free financing) or other incentives especially when the maker is in trouble. If you don't take your full allotment of all models, your allotment of "hot" cars (ones that sell fast at sticker, i.e. most profitable) will go to the dealer near you that cooperated with program.
Thanks for the accurate clarification. You understand the GM way.
How many dealers that GM canned did they re-instate? I'm sure it was part of a channel stuffing plan to show great sales coming out of 'Bamaruptcy.
I'd like to see the Govt agency purchasing numbers. I read that the govt purchases over 25% of the hybrid type vehicles already.
Simple, dealer inventories grow and margins end up shrinking. Most dealers work off a flooring allowance and don't want product sitting for months on end. As I posted below this usually means more dealer incentive to get rid of the vehicles. Fleet sales are problematic because they are typically sparcely equipped models with low margins due to fleet discount pricing.
I was down at my local auto-mall in my fair city looking for a used pickup before Christmas. The local Buick/GMC dealer had an extra 30 or so cars parked across the street in the vacant/closed Hyundai parking area - over-spill from their lot.
My mom has a 2005 Buick Rendezvous.
The worst car anyone in my extended family ever owned.
Bye bye Miss American Pie.
This should help answer your questions. xls files.
http://wardsauto.com/keydata/
I have significant knowledge of GM. They have a history of pushing vehicles onto its dealer networks via increased factory incentives and other more subtle arm-twisting. GM reports sales when vehicles are shipped to dealer lots and rental agencies. The more important factor to look at is the growth or retraction on dealer inventory numbers. At the end of the day, too many cars on lots means more discount to consumers and margin erosion. GM has historically had one of the highest markdown rates in the industry (called "cash on the hood" by insiders).
GM continues to have a litany of problems. Ignore profits since they are derived by funny pension accounting and goodwill (of which I am very conversant). Watch the cashflow. That is the key. The pension liability didn't go away with the BK. The hourly retiree medical did to the extent that they offloaded the liability to the UAW trust. Expect the UAW to scream bloody murder the moment they realize that their actuarial assumptions are overly optimistic. GM has always used an aggressive rate of return on their pension assets and for the last couple years they haven't even come close to their planned objective. Up to the BK they were heavy bond investments and were moving almost completely out of the equity markets, save a couple of PE deals that promised plenty of alpha. They have some smart pension fund management folks but I don't see how they can reverse their ill fortunes leading up to the BK. The UAW is almost impossible to deal with and thinks they are giving up their last child at the smallest of labor adjustments. They reluctantly gave up the jobs bank which basically kept a furloughed worker fully paid for several years. Expect them to bring it back to the table in the next labor negotiations. I can guarantee you that the labor cost structure is still bloated.
I know the owner of a tri-state dealership, 15 total stores, all GM, and I can tell you that what you speak of here is all true. They are about to close 4 locations simply because they can't get rid of new inventory quick enough and said locations are looking more and more like a boneyard for new and unsold crap
GM reports sales when vehicles are shipped to dealer lots and rental agencies
This is false.
The rental agency is the end buyer, so - yes - those shipments are counted as a sale.
The dealer is not the end buyer, so those shipments are not counted as a sale.
GM may count revenue whenever it wants, however the sale is not counted in the month-end figures, such as the figures that were reported today. You claim to be an insider, and you posses some workable knowledge, yet you are getting some fundamental things wrong - very curious.
Best first line ever? Best first line ever.
Ok so GM is the heartbeat of America right? Wrong, the message is if you have a heartbeat you can come in and finance a GM vehicle.. And we all know that GMAC stands for Give Me Another Chance. Just wait until we start talking about the car squatters, 2 years until they recieve a repo notice. Meanwhile the bad debt will just be held off books just like the TBTFs have done with their mortgage crap. Just another pseudo recovery made with another pile of bad debt. You should see all the GMAC cars at the auctions these days. All 2010's-2009's with less then 15k miles on them. Every week 20-30 thousand of them across the nation, many coming from rental agencies that are incentivised to trade in early and replace. Now all these one year olds are also taking up space on the used car lots as well. Another game of kick the can that will eventually lead to a massive overstock and some serious losses. But remember they have GM stock to sell so that only means one thing...Green shoots for GM, so just bring in your unemployment stub and drive out with your new Escalade all gussied up with the 22's and all the latest bling. I say that GM should bring the " Like A Rock" campaign back seeing how they are going to drop like one. Oh and notice the 84 month,0% down, up $7000 dollar rebates with no payments for 4 month campaigns we suggested a few months back. Yup, now we are living it...that didn't take long now did it?
That is right on. They are back to business as usual which is subprime car loans to those with new credit history. Just like the banks they just wiped the slate clean and went back to the same playback as opposed to internal structual changes and improvements on productivity.
And in a few years everyone will through their hands up in the air and repeat the mantra, "Nobody could have seen the recession coming..By the way..got a dollar I can borrow?"
Yep, the best way to buy a car is hire a car broker or dealer that will charge you $500 or so to go with them to buy a car at a dealer to dealer auction. You'll save tons. Note these auctions are dealer to dealer only, NOT auctions open to the public where you see mostly lemons.
How can GM thrive with gasoline, palladium and copper all through the roof, and iron and coal for steel on the way?
It's really a double whammy for GM: input costs are skying, and this in turn constrains their customers even further as their buying power decreases giving GM no leeway to pass on the costs.
It's a simple equation: Prices paid increasing faster than prices received. That's the fate of the US economy as a whole. Except for Tiffany's.
Do you have an alternative location for GM to sell cars other than the dealerships? My God man.... Take your face off the kegorator...
And I get it, pumping volume.. However it only means rekindling discounts going forward if they need to move inventory... That's how it's done.... Always has been.....
Yes, that's how it's always been done. That makes it ok. Classic defense of a broken model. I hear it all the time in Chicago politics.
We did this to death when (New) GM floated back in November, and let's face it, the vast majority were WRONG in predicting the price to fall below IPO of $33 before the day/week/fortnight/month/year ended. I gave it 2 weeks even knowing the sloshing POMO bucks were spilling over to buy, buy, buy. I won't ever be underestimating the nefarious machinations of central government cronies and select industries giving each other handjobs to jizz up the markets. I won't be gobbling up any of their green cream, but for those who are still dabbling in equities, it might be worth a taste.
A company that is just plain shit going to the moon should no longer surprise any of us, but I think this is one case where perhaps the tax payer's money was marginally well spent - if only for the sake of saving a major auto manufacturer which is (belatedly) planning to bring us a competitive zero-emission vehicle AND for the employees of GM and associated companies. Anyway, you never know, they might not be shit forever & may even deserve the price it asks for. One of these days. May be.
GM = channel stuffing and untenable legacy labor costs.
Anything new here?
Buick is the #1 selling car brand in China.
GM's China sales may very well be what is driving the increase in unit volume (for now).
God forbid that the Chinese economy should slow significantly in 2011. If it does, then dealers' lots on both sides of the planet will be stuffed full of GM cars that nobody can afford to buy.
What are the dealers going to do with the extra inventory? I was just at a Chrysler dealer and they had one third the inventory they used to and are not selling. Service dept. keeping them going.
And now we see great sales at Ford and Chrysler as well. Of course, this too will be spun as the world falling apart in some bizarre way.
You know what, why don't you just fuck off, you god damn permabull? Just get out.
What is your malfunction?
Ultimately, to serve as a warning?
Kids, say no to hopium.
Please show us the Default/Repo Rate on these new car "sales".
Somehow I have the crazy idea that you haven't sold something unless it is paid for in full.
GMAC lending me money to buy a GM car is akin to me loaning myself money.
How many of these new cars were paid in full at time of "sale"?
There is nothing but LIES coming out of any mouth that moves on TV.
I fundamentally disagree with this ignorant comment asserting that bondholders were not cheated, how do you figure? The bondholders held a pari-passu claim with the other unsecured debtors (i.e. UAW pension / hc), yet the UAW received many multiples more in terms of recovery while giving up nothing.......SO if two parties have identical rights and one party receives say $10 and the other party receives $10,000, how can you say the former was not cheated? -JP
by Almost Solventon Tue, 01/04/2011 - 14:04
#847139
Taxpayers - YES!
Bondholders - NO!
...And now we see great sales at Ford and Chrysler as well. Of course, this too will be spun as the world falling apart in some bizarre way...
For that spin, I'll defer to the global warming contingency.
On the other hand, if by "great sales" you are attempting to make a logical argument that this is evidence to a solid, foundational sea change in our economic structure to melt credit markets, wake the sleeping giant and strike up the band, I'll pass. My pathos and ethos prevent my mind from accepting this argument as logical.