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GM and Peugeot Citroen are in talks for sharing the cost of developing new engines and other costs. GM and Citroen Peugeot face declining sales and intense price competition in the European market. With declining sales in Europe there is a need to reduce capacity. GM showed a $747 million loss for Europe in 2011. Peugeot Citroen's automotive division showed a loss of 92 million euros in 2011. A decline of 3-5% is expected in European car sales for 2012.

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Most people have not heard of Stellantis N.V. First there was Chrysler, then Fiat merged with Chrysler, now Fiat Chrysler merges with Citroen and Peugeot of France. The result is Stellantis N.V. with CEO Carlo Tavares. This group plans an investment of $35.5 billion in electric vehicles through 2025 and have 5 battery plants built in US and Europe. Tougher emissions standards worldwide are pushing car makers to make these investments in electrification of cars.

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Fiat shares went up 13% on Jan. 2, 2014, after the agreement to buy the UAW trust fund's 41% stake. Fiat has to pay $1.75 billion to the trust fund, and it is now the most indebted automaker except for Peugeot, according to Citi. With sales slump in Europe and without a siginificant presence in Asia, Fiat still has problems, says Peaple. Yet this is a major step forward for Fiat in diversifying beyond its European base- without Chrysler Fiat's net profit in the first 9 months of 2013 would have been a loss of 729 million euros, in the place of the current net profit of 655 million euros for that period.

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The new CEO of Stellantis, the company formed by Carlos Tavares with the merger of Chrysler-Fiat with Peugoet Citroen of France, is Antonio Filosa. Filosa was the head of Americas operations of Stellantis and is Italian from the Fiat operations. Stellantis faces a dropoff in sales in the US with 20% higher inventory and uncertainty about tariffs on production of cars in Canada and Europe. He succeeds Carlos Tavares in a changed environment for automobiles. Tavares had pushed ahead with plans for EV vehicles which now face considerable uncertainty.

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Saab is laying off one fifth of its workforce and Volvo is scaling back production. The European Investment Bank is giving 3 billion euros of aid to the European auto industry, with another 2.8 billion euros planned for April, 2009. 400 million euros each go to Volvo AB maker of trucks, and Scania AB, and 200 million euros to Volvo Cars. Peugeot Citroen, Renault, Fiat, BMW and Daimler each receive 400 million euros. Most of this goes to projects aiming at increasing fuel efficiency and cutting carbon- dioxide emissions.

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With China's automobile market declining for the fifth month in a row, and trade tensions rising, it now appears that carmakers such as Ford expanded too quickly in the Chinese market. Ford, Peugeot, and Hyundai appear to have poorly times their expansion in China, expanding at the tail end of the Chinese boom just ahead of the new Trump administration's efforts to challenge China's lopsided trade balance.  It has become so bad that this report shows workers at a Peugeot factory in China spending their days washing floors and attending Communist political study sessions at work. At a Ford plant workers shifts are reduced to a couple of days a month. Sales grew 3% in 2017 and declined 2% in the first 11 months of 2018, after increases of 14% in previous years taking the market to 28 million in a dizzying ride as it surpassed the U.S. sales of 17.5 million. Overcapacity is a problem in China with the aggressive expansion. There is capacity to make 43 million cars, but will produce 29 million in 2018, according to PwC, consulting firm. Ford meanwhile put in a new plant in Harbin in 2017, expanding its capacity to 1.6 million a year, but sales peaked at 1.27 million in 2016, and are down 6% in 2017, and 34% in 2018 to about 700,000. While there are no layoffs some workers are making only $220 monthly, forcing them to take second jobs as cab drivers or couriers. Suzuki decided to quit in 2018 exiting China entirely just so it would not pile up losses in what is now a market that is way overblown from the boom years. Electric vehicle production in the pipeline of about 7.5 million vehicles will compound this problem further with 32 new plants planned by 26 firms.   ...