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Is Smokey Yunick running VW these days?

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  • Is Smokey Yunick running VW these days?

    Damn...



    Volkswagen Drops 23% After Admitting Diesel Emissions Cheat

    [IMG][/IMG]

    Volkswagen AG lost almost a quarter of its market value after it admitted to cheating on U.S. air pollution tests for years, putting pressure on Chief Executive Officer Martin Winterkorn to fix the damaged reputation of the world’s biggest carmaker. The shares plunged as much as 23 percent to 125.40 euros in Frankfurt, extending the stock’s slump for the year to 31 percent. The drop wiped out about 15.6 billion euros ($17.6 billion) in value.

    VW halted sales of the models involved on Sunday and said it’s cooperating with the probe and ordered its own external investigation into the issue. Winterkorn, who has led the company since 2007, said he was “deeply sorry” for breaking the public’s trust and that VW would do “everything necessary in order to reverse the damage this has caused.”

    Winterkorn, whose contract renewal is scheduled for a supervisory board vote on Friday, now faces a serious challenge to his leadership, said Arndt Ellinghorst, a London-based analyst for Evercore ISI. “This latest saga may help catalyze further management changes at VW,” Ellinghorst wrote in a note Monday.

    The U.S. charges are “grave” and must be clarified swiftly, said Stephan Weil, prime minister of the German state of Lower Saxony, which owns 20 percent of Volkswagen’s voting shares. “Possible consequences can be decided after that.” The European Commission also said it’s taking VW’s cheating seriously and is in contact with U.S. regulators and the company about details of the case. German competitors BMW AG and Daimler AG said on Monday they aren’t aware of a similar U.S. probe into their cars. Shares of both slipped the most in almost a month.

    Diesel and VW’s reputation for German engineering were cornerstones of Winterkorn’s effort to catch up in the U.S. market. The violations, which affect nearly half a million vehicles, could result in as much as $18 billion in fines, based on the cost per violation and the number of cars. Criminal prosecution is also possible. “If this ends up having been structural fraud, the top management in Wolfsburg may have to bear the consequences,” said Sascha Gommel, a Frankfurt-based analyst for Commerzbank AG, whose share rating is under review.

    The Wolfsburg, Germany-based company admitted to fitting its U.S. diesel vehicles with software that turns on full pollution controls only when the car is undergoing official emissions testing, the Environmental Protection Agency said Friday.

    Analysts at Kepler Cheuvreux cut their recommendation on Volkswagen stock to hold from buy, reducing their target price 27 percent to 185 euros. Volkswagen faces not only a short-term drop in sales and a hit to its reputation but also the longer-term risk of litigation in the U.S., the analysts wrote in a note on Monday.

    During normal driving, the cars with the software -- known as a “defeat device” -- would pollute 10 times to 40 times the legal limits, the EPA estimated. The discrepancy emerged after the International Council on Clean Transportation commissioned real-world emissions tests of diesel vehicles including a Jetta and Passat, then compared them to lab results.

    Volkswagen has struggled in the U.S. for years. Sales of VW-brand cars in the country dropped 10 percent last year to 366,970; the company aimed to almost double annual Audi and VW brand sales to 1 million vehicles by 2018. “VW’s U.S. sales target for 2018 had been ambitious as is,” said Klaus Breitenbach, a Frankfurt-based analyst for Baader Bank AG. “Now I believe it is no longer reachable.”


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    • #3
      Is it bad that I just think this is funny?

      Seems more like an affordable way to get some VW stock than anything serious. They'll get a fine and continue kicking ass.

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      • #4
        No, I had a good belly-chuckle going.

        "If I asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses." - Henry Ford

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        • #5
          Originally posted by BLAKE View Post
          Is it bad that I just think this is funny?

          Seems more like an affordable way to get some VW stock than anything serious. They'll get a fine and continue kicking ass.
          If fines total $18 billion it doesn't seem that affordable. Fuck vw, regardless.
          Originally posted by davbrucas
          I want to like Slow99 since people I know say he's a good guy, but just about everything he posts is condescending and passive aggressive.

          Most people I talk to have nothing but good things to say about you, but you sure come across as a condescending prick. Do you have an inferiority complex you've attempted to overcome through overachievement? Or were you fondled as a child?

          You and slow99 should date. You both have passive aggressiveness down pat.

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          • #6
            Reminds me of the old racing phrase. "It ain't cheatin til you get caught."


            I wonder what the values on used TDI's will do? They halted sales on new ones so if someone really wants the fuel mileage, they will find one somehow. Just not a new one.

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            • #7
              Cummins got caught doing this 15 or so years ago.
              Magnus, I am your father. You need to ask your mother about a man named Calvin Klein.

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              • #8
                Knew a chick with the intials VW, dirty little slut she was.

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                • #9
                  So, what does this mean for those cars with this software when they face inspections now?
                  sigpic

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                  • #10
                    Originally posted by Magnus View Post
                    So, what does this mean for those cars with this software when they face inspections now?
                    If cooler heads prevail, they're gonna get a pass. Not their fault.

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                    • #11
                      Cooler heads? Epa? Wut?

                      I think it's hilarious that the "fines per car" exceede the fucking car original msrp by so damn much. That goes beyond addressing the problem, that's just straight up attack on the company to bring them down.
                      sigpic

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                      • #12
                        Originally posted by Magnus View Post
                        So, what does this mean for those cars with this software when they face inspections now?
                        nothing in TX considering there's no emissions testing on diesels
                        http://www.truthcontest.com/entries/...iversal-truth/

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                        • #13
                          Originally posted by Magnus View Post
                          So, what does this mean for those cars with this software when they face inspections now?
                          Accoring to the NY Times: "Over the next year, E.P.A. officials said, owners of the affected vehicles should expect to receive recall notices from the company, including information about how to get their cars repaired at no cost to them."

                          And as one writer at Forbes pointed out, only 75% of consumers take their cars in for safety recalls. If this is not a safety issue and it has the potential to make the engines less efficient and kill the MPG claim VW sold them on, why would they bother getting it fixed? It's fun to bitch about NOx emissions on the internet, but would you give up mileage to reduce your emissions after the fact?



                          The worst part for VW is that no one was trying to find out. It was pure chance that they stumbled on this:

                          Discrepancies in the European tests on the diesel models of the VW Passat, the VW Jetta and the BMW X5 last year gave Peter Mock an idea.

                          Mock, European managing director of a little-known clean-air group, suggested replicating the tests in the U.S. The U.S. has higher emissions standards than the rest of the world and a history of enforcing them, so Mock and his American counterpart, John German, were sure the U.S. versions of the vehicles would pass the emissions tests, German said. That way, they reasoned, they could show Europeans it was possible for diesel cars to run clean.

                          “We had no cause for suspicion,” German, U.S. co-lead of the International Council on Clean Transportation, said in an interview. “We thought the vehicles would be clean.”

                          So began a series of events that resulted in Volkswagen AG admitting that it built “defeat device” software into a half-million of its diesel cars from 2009 to 2015 that automatically cheated on U.S. air-pollution tests

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                          • #14
                            Who gives a shit? What does this actually mean for the consumer?

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                            • #15
                              Originally posted by Magnus View Post
                              I think it's hilarious that the "fines per car" exceede the fucking car original msrp by so damn much. That goes beyond addressing the problem, that's just straight up attack on the company to bring them down.
                              Last I checked the max fine for an engine manufacturer is $25,000 per day in violation.

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