22 August 2016 / 21:21 UTC-07 Tango 01 (02 Shahrivar 1395/19 Dhu I-Qa’da 1437/21 Bing-Shen 4714)

U.S. vehicle maker General Motors (GM) ownes Deutschland car maker Opel.  In turn Opel sells (and builds) its cars in United Kingdom under the name Vauxhall.

GM administrators say the vote by U.K. residents to leave the European Union has caused a crash in Opel-Vauxhall sales (United Kingdom is second largest car market in European Union). GM bean counters expect sales to drop by $400-million USD!  As a result they’ve ordered shift reductions for 5-thousand Opel employees in Deutschland!

But wait, Opel actually made a profit between April and June of this year (after years of losses).  The move by GM is pure paranoia over the Brexit vote, in fact the real reason for any claimed declines in Vauxhall sales could be that some older cars are spontaneously combusting!  Also, U.K. news media have pointed out that this time of year is a natural slowdown for car sales in Britain, and that GM’s paranoid outlook is based on “interim results”.

And here’s something interesting; Northern Ireland news media report that the actual slowdown in new U.K. car sales was a negligable 0.1%, and Vauxhalls are the number 2 and 3 top selling cars (Ford was #1)!

And two weeks ago a report out of England stated “…Vauxhall…..made a major contribution to soaring auto sales.”

I think bean counters at GM are on drugs!