While Toyota Is Barely Edging GM in Worldwide Unit Sales, AP Report 'Forgets' Its Revenues Are Over 50% Higher
In a Monday Associated Press dispatch, reporter Tom Krisher virtually celebrated the idea that Government/General Motors "may be Number 1 again," with happy talk of "dethroning" and "overtaking" Toyota.
Nowhere did Krisher mention the inconvenient fact that Toyota's revenues dwarf GM's to the point where comparing unit sales is an absurd waste of time. Specifically:
- Toyota's sales from its automotive operations for the first six months of its fiscal year (April through September, 2010) amounted to 8,863.6 billion yen (go to the segment information in the report), which translates to roughly $104 billion at an average exchange rate of 85 yen to the dollar.
- GM's revenues during those same two quarters were $67.2 billion.
- Thus, Toyota's auto operations are over 50% larger than all of GM. We're supposed to be impressed that GM is close to selling the same number of cars? We wouldn't be if Krisher had chosen to report revenues, something any who follows business news would clearly have wanted to know.
Here are a few paragraphs of Krisher's free advertising -- er, report:
Resurgent GM nips at Toyota's heels in sales race
General Motors has a shot at being No. 1 again.
The resurgent automaker reported Monday that its worldwide sales last year came within 30,000 of beating Japanese rival Toyota, which took a big hit because of safety recalls.
GM is hiring, producing more and basking in a better reputation for quality. It expects to sell even more cars and trucks this year, putting it within reach of the title of biggest in the world - an honor it held for 76 years before losing it in 2008.
... Dana Rouse, a union official at the pickup truck factory here, called overtaking Toyota the Heisman Trophy of the auto business.
"We're going to take Toyota on, and the people in Flint are going to be a part of that," he said. "This is the birthplace of General Motors. We kind of take it a little more seriously than maybe some other towns."
... Now GM is outselling Toyota in fast-growing China, and its U.S. business is bouncing back. To overtake Toyota, it needs a sales increase of half a percentage point, about the number of Chevy Silverado pickup trucks it sells per month in the U.S.
Toyota is still wounded from recalls of more than 10 million vehicles, mainly to fix gas pedals and floor mats that could make cars speed out of control.
... Dethroning Toyota, experts say, might also help GM with marketing, even if it adds little value to the business. Their advice: GM, which has shed four of its weaker brands in recent years, should focus not on size but on making money.
... GM's global sales grew by a dramatic 12 percent last year, and it turned a $4.2 billion profit in the first nine months of the year. Financial results for the final three months of 2010 aren't in yet, but more profit is expected.
Krisher also erred in at least these items not excerpted:
- He claimed that GM took "nearly $50 billion in government help." No Tom, it's far more than that. Even if your "nearly $50 billion" in direct aid is the correct figure (I believe it's low), there's the roughly $17.5 billion it won't have to pay on its first $50 billion in profits thanks to being helped through TARP. Companies emerging from bankruptcy as new entities normally don't get that break. And that's even before considering the money shoveled into GMAC.
- He also asserts that GM "has limited rebates and low-interest financing." Even a casual TV viewer should know that the alleged limit on low-interest financing Krisher cites is a product of his imagination. GM has been aggressively promoting 0% interest for 60 months almost since it came out of bankruptcy, and more recently has been pushing no payments for the first 90 days. As to rebates, this table from Edmunds shows that GM level of rebates was higher than any other of the Big Six makers in December 2010, November 2010, and December 2009 (though by narrowing amounts in more recent months). Who do you think you're kidding, Tom?
And of course, Krisher never mentioned any of the other thuggish assistance GM has received from Uncle Sam, ranging from ripoffs of disfavored creditors in bankruptcy to far more aggressive and from all appearances orchestrated use of product recalls against its larger rival. Why let the facts get in the way of a phony story, right Tom?
Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.
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Comments
You can't trust the
Submitted by Van Halen on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 1:50am.
You can't trust the JournOList media.
Solution?
Turn it off. Don't read their papers, don't subscribe to their magazines, don't click on their websites. Many of them are already in their death throes (NYT, LAT, WaPo, CNN, etc.). Do your part to help them along by refusing to support their lies.
Agreed. Vote with your remote
Submitted by johnsonl on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 7:38am.
Agreed. Vote with your remote and your wallet!
ABC, CBS, NBC, but mostly B.S.
Submitted by RacerXX on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 10:05am.
I second that!
And write to their
Submitted by Willis_Leon_Johnson on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 11:12am.
And write to their advertisers!
End 'gun violence in America' - Require training and MANDATORY "Shall Carry" by every Citizen.
If harry reid is the best person to lead the senate, what does that say about the other 99 senators?
Toyota is now as American as baseball, apple pie, and Camrys
Submitted by Dave. on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 2:00am.
GM is now nothing more than an American government-owned subsidiary of Chicom Motors, which will last right up until the fantom (as in built on a bed of BS) Chicom economy collapses, thus taking ours down with it.
GM products have sucked since the late 1970s, as have most all UAW goonion produced vehicles in America since then, so it was really only a matter of time.
The trolls in Trollhatten once built some decent road iron, too, but GM pretty much wrecked them in the late 1980s.
The Germans, drunk as they my be on Mondays and Fridays, might just be the last ones left that can still build a decent driver's car.
-Dave
Vote for the American in November
Yeah, it's always nice to
Submitted by mostlymoderate on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 2:49am.
Yeah, it's always nice to have them revenues. Of course these idiots that work at the AP probably never owned their own business or even worked somewhere where they had to think about money so what would THEY know?
Blumer
Submitted by griv on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 4:27am.
is ALL over it. Like sweet on sugar!
Lovely Government Motors.
Submitted by Denny Crane on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 5:41am.
Didn't they just announce that they are going to spend 540 Million dollars on developing and manufacturing a green engine in MEXICO?
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international-business/gm-to-invest-540-mn-in-engine-plant-in-mexico/articleshow/7331881.cms
We Are The 53%
This may be a bit off subject, but,
Submitted by Cyborg 0427 on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 6:49am.
We are being told the economy is getting better. Well I just simply don't see it. From where I sit it seems to only be getting worse. Two short years ago the same insurance policy I got for free from my work now costs $200.00 dollars a month. The same bag of groceries that cost $50.00 now cost $100.00. My housepayment which was $400.00 is now $520.00. Two years ago I could make it on 40 hours of work now I am forced to work 50+ hours and am having a hard time at that. I would say their defination of better is MUCH different than mine. I am sick of people trying to tell me how much better off I am now than I was a few years ago and the part that makes me really sick is they think I should believe it..
Look for the union label when
Submitted by johnsonl on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 7:39am.
Look for the union label when you study those profit margins. Japanese auto workers live just as well as American auto workers, without a union. Businesses and manufacturers are moving to "right to work" states every day. Hard to pay out all those social/unemployment benefits with no freakin' tax base!
Toyota vs. GM
Submitted by Jer on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 9:26am.
Make no mistake, I love my Toyota and I hated my heap of junk known as the Chevy Venture [yes, the van with Bugs Bunny as a logo!!] which lost about 80% of its value within 3-4 years after purchase--and spent almost as much time in the service department as in did in my garage.
That said, unlike Tom, I am not prostrate with grief over the continuing evidence that the flagship company of the American automotive industry for the past three-quarters century appears destined to not just survive, but to convincingly surmount, the immense economic obstacles it faced just a couple of years ago. Nor does my admiration forToyota products and appreciation of that company's massive capital investment in this nation's economy demand that I should dismiss, even root against, the success of General Motors--despite the fact progress by GM has come, in part, from a financial push by the helping hand of the United States government.
Jer
GM should have been allowed to fail
Submitted by hbnolikeee on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 10:25am.
Bailing them out is no help to the economy. It's help to unions that are in no small part the cause of many problems in this country.
Consider how well Ford has been doing without massive tax money. Additionally consider that the preferred share holders were screwed by the "restructuring".
All they're proving ...
Submitted by Tom Blumer on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 12:39pm.
... is that if you ...
... it might "succeed" -- and even then, primarily by selling more cars and creating far more jobs overseas than it probably ever will in the U.S.
My kids, grandkids, and great-grandkids will be paying for the probably $100 billion it took to save about 70,000 U.S. jobs, i.e., $1.43 million for each job.
And you wonder why I'm not impressed with yet another fact-challenged media report?
Do Toyotas cost twice what Government cars cost?
Submitted by Red Jeep on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 10:16am.
Are we talking sales or earnings? Time for another coffee.
Volts against the current
Submitted by Cool Arrow on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 1:16pm.
Yeah, but big business loves the Chevy Volt!
In fact, General Electric is purchasing 12,000 of them. This proves beyond all doubt that the Chevy Volt is a superior automobile.
And at $41,000 it's an absolute steal.
;-)
And I have a choice, buy ge
Submitted by Willis_Leon_Johnson on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 2:28pm.
And I have a choice, buy ge products or something made in overseas.
Overseas wins everytime.
There are lists of companies that are PRO American as opposed to companies that support the leftist nutjobs.
End 'gun violence in America' - Require training and MANDATORY "Shall Carry" by every Citizen.
If harry reid is the best person to lead the senate, what does that say about the other 99 senators?
AP Is Half a Network
Submitted by Boil It Down on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 11:00am.
The Associated Press call themselves "The Global News Network". You would expect to be able to go to such an organization to get the most complete reporting on any given story they deem newsworthy. That's the way to maintain a solid reputation as a "news source". Why then do we have to chase all over the internet to collect enough facts to complete the partial and slanted "news" they report?
This GM/Toyota report is a great example of how the impression from the partial story bears no resemblance to the complete picture. Is this lazy and sloppy or is it deliberate and manipulative? Either way it violates the precepts which are the foundation of responsible journalism.
This is not an isolated or infrequent occurrence for the AP but rather a growing pattern. This story is no where near as damaging as some that they report. They and so many others especially in the liberal media simply cannot be trusted. Therefore I ask, what the hell good are they? I have them bookmarked but rarely use it any longer
Tom Loves Foreign Car Companies
Submitted by BW222 on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 12:26pm.
Tom -
I notice you failed to mention that Toyota was the ONLY major nameplate to have a sales decline in U.S. sales last year.
Tom is as selective with his use of facts as the MSM.
The Topic was GM, but while we're at it ...
Submitted by Tom Blumer on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 1:06pm.
... Yeah, I missed that whopping 0.4% decline:
http://online.wsj.com/mdc/public/page/2_3022-autosales.html
How could I be so totally negligent?
I also forgot to note that Toyota's worldwide automotive revenues were up 17.8% from April-September, that U.S. revenues were up 8.7% during the same period, and that unit sales worldwide were up 18.7%.
I didn't want to overwhelm readers with how well Toyota is doing. I hope you don't mind.
Tom Krisher deliberately left his readers with the impression that GM is about the same size as Toyota, when it's really about 2/3 of Toyota's size.
Again, the topic was GM, and AP bias. You're picking on the wrong person for "selectivity."
*rolls eyes*
Submitted by Blonde on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 2:33pm.
Sometimes you just have to lay it out for people, Tom.
Alas....
Handy Reference Guide to Obama's Gaffes and Goofs ~ Currently Numbering 200 (and Counting)
→ BW222
Submitted by Cool Arrow on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 2:39pm.
And he didn't say anything about mama, or trains, or trucks, or getting drunk.
So what's your point?
ROTFLMAO
Submitted by Tom Blumer on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 7:03pm.
If you had responded before me, I would have typed "what he said."
BW222, the diffrence is, Tom
Submitted by bassndude on Tue, 01/25/2011 - 12:50pm.
BW222, the diffrence is, Tom is calling out the media on a story that they put out. He is not "reporting" on the automotive industry as a whole.
It is bias in the media.
Save a SeAL, club a liberal/troll!!