The Munich-based company said 2009 revenue fell to €50.68 million, but it still hit its targets. BMW Chief Executive Norbert Reithofer attributed the forecast profit to cost management and other measures aimed at improving profitability.
Luxury electric car company Tesla plans to raise $100 million by offering some of its equity to public shareholders. The small auto firm filed with the SEC in preparation for raising the money
The SEC document paints a picture of a company that needs money quickly. Tesla’s accumulate deficit through September 30 of last year was $236 million. Tesla lost $32 million in the first three quarters of 2009. The company had only $106 million in cash at the end of September.
Telsa’s other important source of funds is from the Department of Energy which has given the firm a $465 million loan to build its Model S roadster. Taxpayers have a piece of Tesla just as they do GM and Chrysler
1972, the year before the Arab oil embargo. Gasoline was selling at 36 cents per gallon. Adjusted for inflation, however, the price was actually $1.36 in today's currency. Adjust again for changes in disposable per capita income and the price would have to be $2.66 per gallon to have equivalent impact today.
Were we better off then when we rolled into the filling station in 1972 than we are today? No, because our cars get 60 to 70 percent better mileage today than in 1972 (22.4 miles per gallon versus 13.5 miles per gallon). That more than offsets the 10.5 percent increase in gas prices adjusted for change in inflation and income from then to now.
Now let's look at 1981, the year Ronald Reagan took office. Gasoline sold for $1.38 that year, the equivalent of $2.74 in today's currency. Adjusting for the change in disposable per capita income, prices would have to be $4.30 today to have an equivalent impact.
There are probably three reasons that gasoline prices appear so high to us today. First, many don't fully appreciate the long run effect that inflation has on prices. Second, many don't appreciate how much our incomes have increased relative to prices. Finally, we still remember 1998 very well, the year in which we encountered the lowest gasoline prices since 1949. Gasoline in 1998 sold for $1.03 per gallon, the equivalent of $1.21 in today's currency. Adjusting for growth in per capita income yields a price of $1.35 per gallon in today's terms. Today's price is more than double that and people resent the increase over the last several years, in part, because they think that 1998 prices were normal. But they were not.
Now let's put the recent price increase in terms of real outlays. The average household is spending $136 more on gasoline every month than it was in 1998 and $114 per month more than it were spending in 2002. But, believe it or not, real (inflation-adjusted) disposable income per household has increased even faster than have pump prices; by $800 a month since 1998 and $279 a month since 2002.
Accordingly, Americans are still, on average, economically ahead of the game.
No one likes high gasoline prices. But they are not as bad as most people think. Keep that in mind the next time some politician or media populist starts handing out the pitchforks.
Toyota, which launched the largest auto recall in U.S. history last fall after incidents of random acceleration resulting in fatalities, has just announced an additional recall of 2.3 million vehicles to correct sticking accelerator pedals. The recall was announced late Thursday afternoon, after ABC News informed the company that the latest in a long series of ABC News investigative reports into sudden unexplained acceleration in Toyotas was about to air. Safety expert Sean Kane tells ABC News that since last fall, when Toyota said it had solved the acceleration problem with proposed changes to gas pedals and a recall of 4.2 million cars with suspect floor mats, more than 60 new cases of runaway Toyotas have been reported. He believes this latest recall may still not be a complete fix of a problem that continues to be linked with serious accidents and deaths.
NEW DELHI -- The Indian unit of Sweden's Volvo Car Corporation plans to launch two cars in the next 12 months to tap the growing market for luxury vehicles in the country, a senior executive said Thursday.
The company plans to start selling a new sport-utility vehicle, XC60, in India within the first half of 2010 and will introduce the S60 sedan later in the year.
Nissan Motor Co. (NSANY) plans to start selling its first small car in India from July and export the vehicle later this year as part of its strategy to make the country a global manufacturing hub, the chief executive of its local unit said Wednesday.
"We are well on track to open the new factory in March. Production will start in May and the first hatchback on the V platform will be sold from July," Kiminobu Tokuyama, who is also Nissan Motor India's managing director, told Dow Jones Newswires in an interview.
