Corona study: The crisis hit the auto industry so hard

The corona crisis has hit the auto industry hard again and again!

According to industry expert Ferdinand Dudenhöffer, however, the results of the automobile manufacturers will be very different in the first half of 2020. According to the professor, an ongoing investigation is revealing the “hidden problems”.

The car sales of the VW group fell by 28 percent, that of Toyota by 29 percent.

But: Volkswagen made a loss of 415 euros per car, while Toyota 533 euros and the French Opel parent company PSA even achieved a profit of 707 euros per car.

► This shows that “the VW group definitely has to make more adjustments than Toyota,” wrote Dudenhöffer in his study. Time is of the essence as VW has benefited from the Chinese business that PSA barely has.

With the merger of PSA and Fiat Chrysler, VW’s economies of scale would also decrease.

The comparison in the upper class is just as surprising. The loss per car sold is around 1100 euros for BMW, less than 600 euros for Mercedes and Audi and only 343 euros for Volvo, although they recorded similar sales declines.

High losses during the Corona crisis are “an indicator of the need for adjustments by individual companies,” said Dudenhöffer. The recovery of the auto markets in Europe and America will take a long time. “The capacity must therefore be reduced.”

Despite the crisis, Porsche made almost $ 10,000 on each car, Tesla almost $ 3,000. The American electricity pioneer benefits from the sale of CO₂Certificates to other automobile manufacturers are included in Dudenhöffer.

Unlike everyone else, Tesla is investing in new factories.

GM has focused on the markets in America and China and is making a profit – Ford is deep in the red. The new Ford boss Jim Farley will probably consider whether and how the European company can be restructured in the long term in the coming months, Dudenhöffer expects.

–