I see a lot of German text in there.
Translation? Reason?
Trans: "The Crisis spreads to premium makers". Audi stops the production lines at Neckarsulm facility for one week. Braetzel, a auto industry observer, says situation in European auto industry serious; premium makers not immune.
note: Neckarsulm builds all the longitudinal platform cars - A4, A6, A7, A8 and quattro Gmbh's R8.
Reason: look out the window - at least if you are in Europe. Normal people are broke. The economy's gone off a cliff. This is not a replay of post-Lehmans 2008 scenario.And people now sense it, and are becoming desperate just to stay afloat. New car purchases, for private consumers, are the last thing they need.
Don't think it's just Europe, either. China is the 800 lb gorilla in the room. I predicted this a few days ago:
"my opinion is Mercedes-Benz and Porsche are the first in the last few days to finally acknowledge publicly, at least partially, what is actually happening in the global market place, especially the epic disaster that is China, as opposed to the media "party line", and are not lagging behind the supposed runaway successes of VW/Audi, BMW and JLR, who are still keeping up the pretence through dealer channel stuffing and sales figures manipulation.
Watch and wait. China has blown up and will take almost everyone down. 2008 redux on stilts."
Kilcrohane, Monday at 4:53 PM
Audi have now begun to admit what Mercedes-Benz first came out publicly with, then Porsche. The auto market is in a headlong tailspin right now, particularly for expensive, non-utlity vehicles, contrary to all the guff you've been hearing in the media for the last few months, about a bi-polar auto market, where the premium makers have been somehow miraculously immune to the vast majority of the world's people getting poorer, whilst the oligarchs, numbered in the the tens of thousands, get richer.
If I was JLR, just having bet the farm by launching a $100k SUV and $80k roadster toys, I'd be a tad nervous right now. Hubris has a habit of biting you in the bum when you least expect it.
