Buffett and BYD
futureofcapitalism.com

A $5.2 million City of Los Angeles subsidy for China-based electric car company BYD was the topic of a post here last month. Now it turns out that BYD has been having a rough patch, and that it doesn't look, at least now, like it's one of Mr. Buffett's wiser investments. Here is a dispatch from Shanghai by Yang Jian, managing editor of Automotive News China. It appears under the headline, "Buffett Has Failed to Prevent the Dimming of BYD's Star":

In September, American billionaire Warren Buffett drove BYD Co.'s M6 MPV in China and said it was a fine product. During the same visit, he also appeared on TV and said BYD was a great company.

One month later, BYD's stock tumbled 10 percent after the company disclosed that its third-quarter profits had plunged 99 percent.

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Volvo's Government Ownership
futureofcapitalism.com

One of best free-market-oriented journalists out there right now is Yang Jian, the managing editor of Automotive News China. His latest dispatch is about Volvo:

Geely President Li Shufu, the proud new owner of Volvo Car Corp., couldn't have raised the money to buy the Swedish carmaker from Ford Motor Co. without generous financial backing from two municipal governments.

Now he's discovering the high price of that generosity.

After Li completed the $1.7 billion (11.3 billion yuan) Volvo deal in August, we learned that two local Chinese governments helped bankroll the deal. The government of Daqing, an oil city in northeast China, supplied 3 billion yuan while the government of Jiading, a district of Shanghai, pledged 1 billion yuan.

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Buffett's BYD Goes Gasoline
futureofcapitalism.com

Just as President Obama was spending the day touring yet another battery factory, Yang Jian of Automotive News China has an update on how BYD, the Chinese battery-maker in which Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway made a highly touted investment, is moving away from electric vehicles:

BYD has abandoned its false hopes for strong EV sales. Instead the company is investing in its gasoline vehicles and is moving them upscale....

While BYD shakes up its lineup of gasoline cars, it also appears to be reconsidering its investment in EVs.

Read More...

Buffett's BYD Goes Gasoline
futureofcapitalism.com

Just as President Obama was spending the day touring yet another battery factory, Yang Jian of Automotive News China has an update on how BYD, the Chinese battery-maker in which Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway made a highly touted investment, is moving away from electric vehicles:

BYD has abandoned its false hopes for strong EV sales. Instead the company is investing in its gasoline vehicles and is moving them upscale....

While BYD shakes up its lineup of gasoline cars, it also appears to be reconsidering its investment in EVs.

Read More...

Buffett and BYD
futureofcapitalism.com

A $5.2 million City of Los Angeles subsidy for China-based electric car company BYD was the topic of a post here last month. Now it turns out that BYD has been having a rough patch, and that it doesn't look, at least now, like it's one of Mr. Buffett's wiser investments. Here is a dispatch from Shanghai by Yang Jian, managing editor of Automotive News China. It appears under the headline, "Buffett Has Failed to Precent the Dimming of BYD's Star":

In September, American billionaire Warren Buffett drove BYD Co.'s M6 MPV in China and said it was a fine product. During the same visit, he also appeared on TV and said BYD was a great company.

One month later, BYD's stock tumbled 10 percent after the company disclosed that its third-quarter profits had plunged 99 percent.

Read More...

Volvo's Government Ownership
futureofcapitalism.com

One of best free-market-oriented journalists out there right now is Yang Jian, the managing editor of Automotive News China. His latest dispatch is about Volvo:

Geely President Li Shufu, the proud new owner of Volvo Car Corp., couldn't have raised the money to buy the Swedish carmaker from Ford Motor Co. without generous financial backing from two municipal governments.

Now he's discovering the high price of that generosity.

After Li completed the $1.7 billion (11.3 billion yuan) Volvo deal in August, we learned that two local Chinese governments helped bankroll the deal. The government of Daqing, an oil city in northeast China, supplied 3 billion yuan while the government of Jiading, a district of Shanghai, pledged 1 billion yuan.

Read More...