Having lost A$152.8 million in 2012, GM Holden is coming off one of its worst years on record. And it isn’t hiding the fact that it’s losing most of its money from manufacturing vehicles in Australia.
“We are losing [money] on our locally produced cars and that’s obviously a position we need to reverse,” said Holden chief financial officer George Kapitelli in a statement. “What the headline numbers today don’t show is the difference between General Motors profitability versus Holden profitability. Holden’s imported portfolio is profitable. The losses we have talked about today are a direct result of Holden building cars in Australia.”
According to Australia’s Daily Telegraph, Holden lost $730 million over six of the past eight years, while making a $202 million profit over the same period. Regardless, the financial guys are keeping calm.
“Holden has zero debt, strong cash reserves … and a very healthy pension fund. I think this is a position that many companies across the world aspire to, but few achieve,” Kapiltelli said. “Despite the loss Holden is well positioned for future profitability, with a strong and healthy balance sheet and zero debt.” So, there’s that.
As part of its upcoming product offensive, Holden will launch the much-awaited VF Commodore, a refreshed Cruze, the Malibu midsize sedan, as well as the Trax subcompact crossover; it has recently launched the new Colorado pickup truck and Colorado 7 SUV (available as the Chevrolet Trailblazer in other parts of the world), and will spend significantly more on marketing this year.
Comments
maybe if they didnt refresh their cars every 7 years, they wouldnt loose business, who wants to buy a brand new 7yo car! the vf shoulve been released in 2009!. we should be awaiting the VG by now.
the GFC caused the delay in VF release, it also gave chev time to add their personal touch to the update version, pontiac had little time & money so only changed it’s apperance, chev reached into the cars core and made changes over a longer period till both sides were happy with the result.
if you look at holdens history for commodore a refreshed model was released every two/three years and a major platform change every ten years
VE is the only one with more then four years in the market
also VG is used (1990 ute)
They lost money in 2004 to about 09 and then again this year. In 04, they had just released the VZ Commodore and the VE a.k.a Billion dollar baby was just 2 years away so it was still being completed. Then in 09 they were making the VE Series 2. This year they have made the VF. Every other year was a financial gain. So i think we know that this is nothing to worry about. Holden is just spending money to make money.