Pour la première fois depuis 2004, les trois grands constructeurs automobiles américains sont profitables, y compris General Motors, qui a annoncé aujourd'hui un bénéfice net de 7,6 milliards de dollars pour 2011, une hausse de 62% par rapport à 2010.
GM et Chrysler ont reçu l'aide de l'État fédéral dans le cadre d'un plan de sauvetage qui a été dénoncé mardi par Mitt Romney, comme je l'ai mentionné dans ce billet, et défendu le même jour par Steve Rattner, responsable de ce dossier au sein de l'administration Obama, comme on peut le lire dans cet article du Detroit Free Press dont je cite un extrait dans le texte :
Rattner's task force struck the deals that led to the managed bankruptcies of GM and Chrysler. Both automakers have been adding jobs and posted strong gains in recent quarters. In all, more than $80-billion in taxpayer's funds were part of the deal, though much of that has been paid back and the government expects to recoup more.
"These companies would have closed their doors and liquidated" without government financing, Rattner said Tuesday. He explained that - at the height of the financial collapse - there simply wasn't private financing available to prop up the companies and provide interim cash to keep them open, meaning they would have shut down and been sold in pieces in a regular bankruptcy procedure. "We took every phone call, we made as many outgoing calls as we could think of."