Ford Asks Gov’t for $9 Billion

Posted on Dec 2, 2008

cartype.com

After a dismal November, Ford Motor Co. is hanging by a thread, but the automaker told Congress on Tuesday that it is in better shape than Chrysler and General Motors and could make it through its current economic crisis with a little help—to the tune of $9 billion in standby loans.

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The New York Times:

In a 33-page plan submitted to the Senate Banking Committee, Ford said it was healthier than the other two Detroit automakers but warned that its fortunes were closely tied to that of its two rivals, General Motors and Chrysler, both of which have said they could soon run out of money.The industry’s troubles were evident in the dismal United States sales figures for November that the manufacturers reported on Tuesday. Ford’s sales fell 30.6 percent from a year earlier; Toyota and Honda did slightly worse, and hard-hit General Motors significantly worse, with a 41 percent fall in sales.

“Because our industry is an interdependent one, with broad overlap in supplier and dealer networks, the collapse of one or both of our domestic competitors would threaten Ford as well,” the company said in its plan. “It is in our own self-interest, as well as the nation’s, to seek support for the industry at a time of great peril to this important manufacturing sector of our economy.”

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