An “Economic Analyst” Blog

One of the three big companies in the American auto industry files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. It claims that a deal with Fiat has been reached and the company will be revived one way or another.

Chapter 11 bankruptcy does not mean that Chryler will be liquidated, but that it will be reorganized. Therefore, there are chances for the company to continue to exist.

Anyway, it looks like one of the big three admitted it is bankrupt. We are waiting for Ford and General Motors to do the same…

The Sun might shine over Oracle after it decided to acquire Sun Microsystems for 7.4 billion dollars after IBM decided not to buy this company.

Therefore, Oracle will now own the Java programming language and the Solaris operating system.

Oracle pays 9.50$ per share. The Friday close price for Sun was 6.69$. Today, Sun shares opened above 9 dollars. I wander who new about it?

Microsoft decided it would be better for their business to open a chain of retail stores. When many companies close their stores, Microsoft does just the opposite.

Is this because they want to show that they are not affected by the crisis or is it because Apple did this for a while and obtained quite a nice profit from selling products in their own stores?

Swiss bank UBS reported a 13 billion euro (19.7 billion CHF) loss for 2008, announced that 15000 people will be fired, but decided that the employees will receive bonuses worth more than one billion euro (2.2 billion CHF). Again, something does not seem right

Intel decided to close five of their manufacturing facilities in Asia (one in Philippines, two in Malaysia) and US (Santa Clara, Oregon).

Does this mean people no longer buy enough computers or is this move supposed to stop the drop in processor prices?

Either way, the crisis starts to affect the hardware industry.

The US Senate decided not to “invest” billions of dollars in the US auto industry. Therefore, GM, Ford and Chrysler are now close to bankruptcy. Also, about three million people are about to lose their jobs.

Now, it looks like everybody hopes Obama will do something about this early next year… I very much doubt it.

In a surprise statement, Honda announced that they will not participate in the 2009 Formula 1 Season. Their decision was caused by the deterioration of the global auto market.

The F1 team is up for grabs, but will anyone want it? Also, can we expect other teams to follow? Will we see a Grand Prix similar to the one in Indianapolis (back in 2005) where only six cars run?

The Finish mobile phone producer Nokia decided to stop selling its products in Japan (luxury products excepted). It looks like the market share Nokia managed to acquire in Japan did not meet the expectations and the investments no longer seem profitable.

Does this mean that Nokia will start focusing on European markets? Will other companies in the industry follow its example? Will this be the start of a global trend that will make companies “retreat” towards their traditional customers?

Standard & Poor’s just reduced the Ford rating from B- to CCC+ (seven grades below investment quality).

This happened while Ford, General Motors and Chrysler try to convince the US Congress to accept a bailout plan for the auto industry. It looks like the Congress does not want to spend people’s money so easily, therefore the bailout might be delayed. In this case, the three big companies in the US auto industry might be in trouble.

The Ford rating just dropped. Will GM and Chrysler follow?