Posted on 07/27/2019 9:43:24 PM PDT by LibWhacker
Some very bad news today – for Nissan.
Profits are down 99 percent. Not a typo. A near-total wipeout – which triggered the wiping out of 12,500 jobs, the immediate suspension of manufacturing in Indonesia and Spain and an announcement that Japan’s second-largest car company will reduce its model lineup by at least 10 percent by 2022.
Nissan’s U.S. market share is down to 7.9 percent; it was 8.1 percent a year ago.
It is quite possible there won’t be a Nissan by 2022.
So, what’s gone awry?
One thing – a thing which is going awry generally – is the monecy being wasted on electric cars for which there is no market. Or rather, which there’s no money to be made from making.
Nissan’s Leaf – the company’s first electric car – cost Nissan almost as much money to develop as it continues to lose “selling” it. And when the federal subsidy for electric car “purchases” goes away, it will cost Nissan – and everyone else “selling” electric cars – even more as people decline to “buy” them at all.
Which will happen, because the ending of the subsidies amounts to a $7,500 effective increase in the cost to the buyer – the price of “green,” as it were.
Nissan, et al, will then have to resort to discounts of their own equivalent to the federal subsidy, just to get the electric turduckens off their lots.
This would be no big deal if it were only a handful of electric Turduckens. But because “climate change,” Nissan and everyone else has been forced to commit billions to development of hundreds of thousands of electric cars they won’t be able to sell – unless the ability of people to buy them somehow increases by 30-50 percent or more, this being the rough difference (all else being equal) between an electric car and an otherwise equivalent non-electric car.
Who’s going to ante up?
The going-away subsidy all by itself is equivalent in value to 3,125 gallons of regular unleaded at current prices (about $2.40 per gallon). That fills up a 12 gallon gas tank about 260 times – enough to take you 93,000 and change miles at 30 MPG.
However much people may believe the sky is about to fall because “climate change,” most aren’t going to walk away from what amounts to free fuel for nearly 100,000 miles of driving – by not driving an electric car.
The 12,500 jobs that just went up in smoke – along with Nissan’s profits and possibly Nissan itself – are just the beginning.
A real scheisse show is percolating.
But there is a silk lining to this sow’s ear – for the moment.
It is that you stand to score a deal on any Nissan (excepting the Leaf). The news about Nissan’s precarious finances is already spreading like an oil slick on the ocean and dealers will be increasingly desperate to offload what they can while they can.
And here’s the crazy thing:
Much of what Nissan sells is actually good stuff. In part, because it hasn’t got much of the new stuff – things like turbo fours in big trucks and direct injection and ASS in everything. Nissan is also the only car company whose new cars let you drive without “buckling up for saaaaaaaaaaaafety.”
Well, without badgering you like an annoying mother-in-law via a buzzer that won’t shut up until you do.
All the more reason to shop now.
While you still can
[ Nissan’s Leaf – the company’s first electric car – cost Nissan almost as much money to develop as it continues to lose “selling” it. And when the federal subsidy for electric car “purchases” goes away, it will cost Nissan – and everyone else “selling” electric cars – even more as people decline to “buy” them at all. ]
GO GREEN!!!
I owned two Nissan Altimas in the 1990’s and really liked them. Very dependable and classy looking. We now drive a 2006 Toyota Avalon we bought new in 2005 - have yet to get to the 100,000 mile mark and it has been a great car also. Wish American cars were as good.
I’m typing five miles from Nissan North America HQ
i don’t much care for them
I rent cars all year
Only one I like is the 370 and the GTR
I’d prolly like the Cummins Titan
Their SUV line no thanks
Give me Lexus
I did like the big infinity though
The worst is the crap that turns off the engine every time you stop the car. I bought a 2017 Audi that had that. Man, that was annoying and certainly all that stopping and starting can't be good for the engine. Thankfully, with the help of some folks on the Audi forum I was able to hack the ECU to permanently disable it.
2010 se 4x4 owner here. Only one issue, front differential seal went out. Otherwise no issues, and the hungry 5.6L does burn gas like it is going out of style, but no cylinder disable “feature” to kill your lifters.
Not to say the GM LS is a bad engine, they are not. But the LS is suffering like many newer engines from gas saving gadgetry, which disproportionately wears on the valvetrain, and sucks the loud pedal happiness out. When folks grab LS engines at junkyards, they rip out the cylinder deactivation feature and drop in a new cam, and then you have a great motor.
I am waiting for the F150e. Then the Titan will get some modifications. The 32v vk56 has a lot of potential, but because it is not nearly as common as Ford or gm v8s, modification is a row you have to walk by yourself.
I still have not been able to stomach a gm product since the bailouts.
If Ford does not get f150e correct, I will go Toyota if Titan is not an option.
Maybe they’d sell more if they changed those ugly-ass angry dog grills. They’re not the only ones. I don’t know who started that style trend but they sure are ugly.
Or alternately Russ Darrow Nissan who will soon be competing with the new Honda dealership in the fall
Now THERE is a real problem for both manufacturers and consumers - CAFE. The requirements by unelected extremist Green bureaucrats were getting out of hand, and were about to cause everyone big problems. Fortunately Team Trump dialed back the ridiculousness, but all it will take is another Dem President and we’ll be back in the soup.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-cafe-fuel-economy-standards-rollback/
Das guy mit die german accent, when told that Nissan would be dead by 2020 was heard to exclaim
“Dat-SUN?”
(O
Based on an old early Nissan name-change joke)
Did you know gasoline never did come naturally with lead in it? The auto makers asked the gas companies to add it to help lube the top end of car engines.
When it was left out there really wasn’t an earth shattering difference so it didn’t actually make engines run better or cause the valves to burn out all of a sudden. Since then they simply changed how they make the valve seats and valves to put up with a little more heat. We were sold a load of bull about lead in the gas. Maybe back in the 20’s, 30’s, 40’s, and 50’s it helped but not much after that.
What really irked me was the gas companies charged extra to put lead in the gas (that was understandable) but then they charged extra for not putting it in. They actually charged more for not doing something and not adding the lead additive. Crazy. It had become a scam.
WTH indeed
I always have a Nissan I lease, so every three yrs.
Rented a rogue recently - great car. Drove my buddy’s Toyota RAV4 a long distance crappy car crappy drive. Bad pick-up in heavy traffic. The cruise control was worthless.
Why are people complaining about Nissan pickups? You don’t go to Nissan for pickups. You go to ford. No?
How about this as another reason for Nissan’s predicament:
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/nov/19/nissan-renault-carlos-ghosn-arrest-shares
Another ‘Rock-Star’ global industrialist who doesn’t live up to his media rep. The suggestion is that he has been concealing problems at all the automakers in his alliance.
Renault owns Nissan, do the math. Crappy cars worldwide.
That’s a tragedy. Nissan’s were rapidly becoming more reliable than Honda or Toyota. Oh well, once their gone, Honda and Acura it is then.
I’ve been a be American buy American type of guy most my life but these days I’ll stick with Toyota and Honda or Ford but would still like to own one more Corvette. Probably won’t though.
I drive a 1995 Honda Odyssey. It has 333,000+ miles.
IIRC, Ghosn has/had dealings with the Clinton Foundation. Wonder if that figures into his legal problems at all...
Nissan has made a couple of pretty good motors in the past. Not as good as Honda and Toyota, of course.
The cars? Meh.
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