If there is any justice in the world, the clink of gold coin at Ford HQ in Dearborn should be accompanied, after close of play, of course, by the clink of glasses. A toast to the CEO. And the chairman who brought him in and let him get on with it.
Today’s results were pretty much in line with a key analyst’s poll and the best for a decade so cheers to Alan Mulally, Bill Ford and thousands of blue oval worker bees worldwide for some good auto news for once. If the doom ‘n’ gloom being forecast here this week, in the likes of the King’s Speech most outside of the UK haven’t heard of, 2011 is going to be even more challenging in some markets than ’10 and that Hail Mary market, China, into which Ford was a bit slow, is starting to show worrying signs of turning against the car, at best slowing recent startling growth.
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Monday, all eyes turn towards Chrysler, which Ford might point out did take the government bailout cash, and GM (ditto) in due course.
There have also been some other good results and, for your convenience and delectation, we have grouped them all together here.
For every upside, there is often a downside and one intriguing result of production being on the up in some places is a shortage of parts in others. VW, for one, is not wanting to blame suppliers, however.
Meanwhile, the Renault ‘espionage’ saga rolled on for another week – here’s our latest on that.
As old hands in the news biz used to say, the ‘story’s got legs’ (it will run and run). Sure has.
Have a nice weekend.
Graeme Roberts
Deputy/News Editor
just-auto.com
