alt Hacker NewsA German economist explained on Insta that the main reason they are doing this is because Moody's making politics and reduced VWs rating, and VW is one of the largest credit holders in Europe and now they have been forced to act and do something about this unplanned rating change which will make loans expensive for them, without actually being a concrete automotive related issue in the first place.
> because Moody's making politics and reduced VWs rating...
> without actually being a concrete automotive related issue in the first place...
VW's market share in China (it's largest market) has collapsed - in 20 years it went from around 20% of all cars in China to 10% and current deliveries this year in China have fallen by 36%. This is a huge fall for a company whose Jetta was literally China's Model T.
VW Group has been dependent on China, much of Europe, and the US for almost 2 decades. It lost the American market in the 2010s when Diesel-gate pushed it's American ICP to Toyota, Nissan, and Tesla and it lost it's Chinese marketshare when China began the NEV policy back in the 2010s. And European car sales haven't recovered to pre-COVID amounts.
It isn't entirely an automotive issue, but it is very much a management issue. And nothing can be done about it - voting share is split between Lower Saxony, the Qatari royal family (17% voting share), the Porsche family, and IG Metall. Given the degree of state ownership in VW, it'll make GM's collapse look like a cakewalk.