Holden Announces $6 Million Loss For 2007

[JoeT]

Holden Bounces Back, But Toyota Still Rules

Chris Gable
29 July 2008
www.wheelsmag.com.au

Its 2007 financial results, announced today, show that the car-maker is on track and here for the long haul, says new boss, Mark Reuss. But Toyota still rules the roost.

GM-Holden has announced a $6 million net loss for the financial year ended December 31, 2007. Even though it’s still in the red, today’s announcement represents a massive turnaround from Holden’s $146 million loss for 2006, which came on top of a $145 million loss in 2005.

GM Holden boss, Mark Reuss (pictured) announced the car-maker’s financial results in a national media teleconference from Melbourne this afternoon. It was his first financial report announcement since taking up the GM-Holden reins in February, this year.

Mr Reuss described the result as “a good news story” and “an almost break-even position”. “Put it another way,” he said, “[the result represents] about a $140 million turnaround over the last year.”

He said the results showed that GM-Holden had recovered in a difficult market and “strong headwinds” and was “…aggressively re-investing” in the future. Evidence of that re-investment, he said, was Holden’s announcement of the closure of Family II engine production and “… re-investing here in a range of alternative fuels and technologies to put us in a strong position to tackle the challenges here in the next decade”.

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Holden Narrows 2007 Losses

Marton Pettendy
29 July 2008
www.goauto.com.au

GM Holden has reported a $6 million after-tax operating loss for its 2007 financial year ending December 31, representing a substantial improvement on the hefty $146 million and $145 million losses it posted in 2006 and 2005 respectively.

Presenting his first financial report for GM Holden since becoming chairman and managing director in February , Mark Reuss said the result was a “good-news story” for Holden, describing it as a $140 million turnaround.

“It’s my pleasure to report for the first time in my new job… that Holden has improved from a loss position of $146 million last year (2006) to an almost break-even position in 2007 with a small $6 million loss – or, to put it another way, about a $140 million turnaround here over the last year,” he said.

Mr Reuss said that excluding restructuring costs of $77.5 million last year, when GM Holden continued its changeover from VZ Commodore derivatives to a full VE Commodore model line-up, the company would have made a pre-tax profit of $27.5 million.

GM Holden blamed its $146 million loss in 2006 mainly on its $1 billion investment in the VE Commodore, 57,300 examples of which were sold in Australia last year – nearly 10,000 more than the number of Falcons sold by Ford Australia – to retain its position as Australia’s top-selling vehicle for the 12th consecutive year, helped by record V8 sales.

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Holden Announces $146.5m Loss For 2006 Financial Year (July 2007)
Holden Chasing Profits, Not Market Leadership, Says Boss (December 2007)

GM Holden boss Mark Reuss

[chinamonty]

With the changeover to the new model that is a lot better than i thought they would. They should be congratulated on their performance.

[Aych Es Vee]

2005 and 2006 ..... they were spending money on the VE.
It damn well SHOULD be a far significant less loss for 2007, when the VE was already released.

[ford&holden]

It's all cyclic, Holden is heading towards profits, Ford will make another loss before it's heads back into the black.

Toyota just starting turning a profit in the last 2 years while for the past 10 years Ford and Holden were far more profitable, yet Toyota will be commended for being healthy, they should be turning a profit on 200,000 + vehicles.

[redimpss5]

Great pic!! Build the 49 and the losses may shrink!!

[redTT]

wait until all their investments starts paying off, their Zeta development costs, their Camaro development costs and their engine development costs have now largely been completed.

[Rick_VT]

Originally Posted by redTT

wait until all their investments starts paying off, their Zeta development costs, their Camaro development costs and their engine development costs have now largely been completed.

If i remember correctly i think GM stuck Holden with hundreds of millions in bills when they delayed the Zeta program for NA which partly cause the big losses they had in 2005-6, with the big downturn in large car sales only a 6 million dollar loss is pretty good, goes to show how good a job they did in taking cost out of making the VE to help limit the loss, lets hope the dollar helps them out a bit with the exports and they can get back to making 100-200 million dollar profits consistently

[Slick_Holden]

Yep if they don't make a profit this year, Then i would worry, Well infact if the loss went up i would worry..
Big investment into the VE project, And this is why holden has been slow in making S2 models, Scrap them forever maybe, Only 1 series with running changes for models now.

With fuel on the drop out of nowhere, Rumours are $70 per barrel..
We might see Petrol under $1 again, But lets hope car makers don't go back into there old way, ****, Lets hope we don't.

[mikmak]

^^^I thought I had read (a few times) that there wont be a series 2 anymore, but like you said, continue with running changes.

As for the loss, I would be surprised if they really got anywhere substantial this year. They still need to get some serious sales from GMDAT, which of course needs better supply. I know they are selling as well as they can but they are supposed to be generating bigger profits. I don't think Holden is getting what they need in that department but I'm still being patient. Yes, they are making more money per sale, but the amount of cash they would have to have laid out in regard to logistic and administrative support would suck that up pretty quickly. Of course that is going to be another cost when they introduce the new models.

[Chaz_23]

Wow, that Reuss fellow looks even creepier than LaNeve.

[ford&holden]

Originally Posted by Chaz_23

Wow, that Reuss fellow looks even creepier than LaNeve.

[Slick_Holden]

Originally Posted by mikmak

^^^I thought I had read (a few times) that there wont be a series 2 anymore, but like you said, continue with running changes.

As for the loss, I would be surprised if they really got anywhere substantial this year. They still need to get some serious sales from GMDAT, which of course needs better supply. I know they are selling as well as they can but they are supposed to be generating bigger profits. I don't think Holden is getting what they need in that department but I'm still being patient. Yes, they are making more money per sale, but the amount of cash they would have to have laid out in regard to logistic and administrative support would suck that up pretty quickly. Of course that is going to be another cost when they introduce the new models.

Lets hope it's a profit, Even if only 10 mill, As long as it's in the right direction.

New Epica looks better then the past ones, Diesel and 6 speed will help, I would like to see Holden adjust the suspension tune more there way, And then it's a good car for daily driving.

Maybe soon we might see some quality small cars?.

I think that's a GM flaw, They wanted holden to make more money, But they forgot holden was making good money as it was, Now they sent Money Mooney over he in my opinion ****ed up alot of good work, And i believe they enjoyed as i did seeing the back of him.

Originally Posted by Chaz_23

Wow, that Reuss fellow looks even creepier than LaNeve.

Almost worse then Denny Mooney.

[RedHotMike]

Originally Posted by Slick_Holden

Lets hope it's a profit, Even if only 10 mill, As long as it's in the right direction.

New Epica looks better then the past ones, Diesel and 6 speed will help, I would like to see Holden adjust the suspension tune more there way, And then it's a good car for daily driving.

Maybe soon we might see some quality small cars?.

I think that's a GM flaw, They wanted holden to make more money, But they forgot holden was making good money as it was, Now they sent Money Mooney over he in my opinion ****ed up alot of good work, And i believe they enjoyed as i did seeing the back of him.

Thats the problem. GM had quality small & medium cars but Aus consumers decided they weren't prepared to pay the money for them. Meanwhile the likes of Hyundai etc serve up more and more crap that seems to sell by the boat load. So, I guess that Holden took the attitude of "If you can't beat them, join them".

Red Hot Mike

[paul8488]

Why do people use redesigning cars as an excuse for not making money? Car companies are constantly spending money on redesigning and redevelopping their vehicles. In fact it's much smarter to constantly have something on the design table, instead of doing it all at once (every 5 years, for example). Saying "Oh, the loss doesn't count because they spent so much redesigning a car" doesn't make any sense to me, because it's an integral part of the budget, not a one-time charge that can be explained away.

[mmciau]

Originally Posted by paul8488

Why do people use redesigning cars as an excuse for not making money? Car companies are constantly spending money on redesigning and redevelopping their vehicles. In fact it's much smarter to constantly have something on the design table, instead of doing it all at once (every 5 years, for example). Saying "Oh, the loss doesn't count because they spent so much redesigning a car" doesn't make any sense to me, because it's an integral part of the budget, not a one-time charge that can be explained away.

Perhaps the real key is just how much was sent back by Holden to GMNA as a 'dividend' and just how much Holden is 'subsidising/underwriting the G8' into the US!


Mike