This was originally a comment and I know there have been hundreds of diaries on proposed bailout of the Big 3 Automakers. But I wanted to put this out to see if anyone else has seen it
I was Googling something else when I ran across the following story from Nov.7,2008.
General Motors (GM) opened today a $300 million, flexible assembly plant in St. Petersburg, Russia, in presence of President Dmitry Medvedev. The plant will add 70,000 units of capacity to more than 100,000 already available to GM at joint venture and partner facilities in the country. It will build the Opel Antara and Chevrolet Captiva SUVs and, as of late 2009, the all-new Chevrolet Cruze compact sedan. The plant features a flexible, modern design that can accommodate a variety of different models.
All this at the same time we were seeing this:
(My original link was wrong in the comment so I tried to fix it here.)
(Emphasis added)
Headline: Stocks rally despite bad news
Wall Street manages gains after two-session retreat despite GM and Ford losses and a brutal labor market report.
"All three major stock gauges fell for the week, after last week's big rally. The Dow and the Nasdaq both lost 4.2% in the week, while the S&P 500 fell 3.8%.
Stocks had been in the plus column throughout the session, losing some steam after the late-morning release of General Motors' big loss, before recharging. Stocks again lost some ground ahead of President-elect Barack Obama's afternoon press conference.
However, stocks managed gains as investors took advantage of a big selloff. Stocks plunged sharply in the two sessions following Obama's historic victory, with recession fears sparking a retreat after a sharp rally through Election Day. The Dow had lost 929 points, its biggest two-day point loss ever."
So while the rest of us watched our 401ks sitting in the tank, taking a minuscule breath from the thought that: "Well, at least I didn't lose my ass again today!", the Big 3 Automakers were priming the pump for a $25 Billion bailout. All the while GM was opening a $300 Million assembly plant in Russia that would employ an additional 1700 17000 Russian (not American) workers.
What the hell is going on?
GM nearly doubled industry growth in Russia from January-September 2008 with sales up 44 percent to 256,765 cars and SUVs. GM reached a market share of 11 percent and was the leading international vehicle manufacturer in Europe’s second biggest market. Chevrolet sales in Russia grew by 33.5 percent or 44,145 units in the first nine months of this year to 175,798. Opel is the fastest growing brand in the Russian vehicle market with sales rocketing to 78,051 in the January-September period, which corresponds to a growth rate of 73.3 percent.
IMO the CEO's of GM need to be threatening someone else besides Americans about why they will lose jobs. Is the bailout just for the American part of this corporation?