Vauxhall-Opel has returned to profit for the first time since 1999 after being acquired from General Motors (GM) by France's PSA Group last year.
As revealed in PSA’s annual financial results, the two brands posted operating profits of €502m (£448m) in the first half of 2018, compared with a loss of $257m (£196m) in 2016 - Vauxhall-Opel’s last full year under GM ownership.
Ambitious revival planned for Vauxhall-Opel under PSA
The results can be partly attributed to PSA CEO Carlos Tavares’ ambitious cost-saving plan for Vauxhall-Opel, which intends to bring the two brands to an operating margin of 2% by 2020. New models, such as the Insignia Grand Sport and Grandland X, have also boosted sales across Europe.
PSA, which already consisted of Peugeot, Citroën and DS brands, bought Vauxhall-Opel alongside GM’s European financial operation for £1.9bn in November 2017. The deal made PSA the second-biggest-selling car group in Europe after the Volkswagen Group, with a 17% share of the market.
The acquisition has helped the PSA Group boost revenues by 40% so far in 2018, up to €38.6bn, with operating profits up 48% to €3bn.
Tavares recently told Autocar that Vauxhall-Opel would shake off its long history of loss-making and become “a true European champion” under the group. It will officially end links with GM in 2024, moving every model over to two modular PSA platforms.
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Opel lost €179m in the last 5
Opel lost €179m in the last 5 months of last year, yet made €502m in the first 6 months of this year!
Yes PSA are turning things around, but I don't believe that a company can be turned around that quickly without some fancy accounting either to boost current profitability or (more likely) to cause some of the previous losses. And that's me speaking as an accountant
3000 have resigned but they
3000 have resigned but they received several annual salaries in return and most went in 2018 so it will take one to three years further to see the profit of it, right now it's actually an increased cost.
The PSA cars Crosland and Grandland have sold a handful of cars, but they are not particularly successful, old Opel Mokka who came in 2012, have all the time, and still sell better than either of them and overall sales have fallen, meaning increased sales of these two new ones has nothing to do with the matter.
Instead, this is entirely a result of that Opel no longer pays for the development of American GM cars, which Opel has not been paid for.
Opel paid the entire development while the profit from the sales remained in the USA and was counted as a profit at Buick and Chevrolet who did not pay anything in development costs for the new cars.
50 % of Opel's entire business previously consisted in developing cars and technology for American GM while the income from the sale never was counted in to the performance of Opel.
Opel's losses were a trick of GM in order to get the American brands to look more successful and increase their profit by placing a large amount of the costs at Opel.
That this has now completely ceased means that the money stays with Opel and thus a profit.
Sorry but you are talking
Sorry but you are talking rubbish, 3000 did not resign, and if they did they would never have been paid off to go, also the new SUVs have been very successful, all over Europe and have outsold all early predictions, The Astra and corsa have dropped sales, and the Adam and Viva/Karl are a waste of time, the Insipid however has really outshone its predecessor (not a hard job) with massive increases in sales.... and PSA will still be paying royalties to GM until 2024, or until all platforms and running gear has been switched, the profits that have been made are via PSA's aggresive cost cutting and model deletion, and parts holding cancellations, all previously indicated by the PSA Group
Not just GM debt removed.....