Monthly Archives December 2014

US Auto Sales: Key Factors

For an automobile consumer, the key factors that affect the decision to purchase a new vehicle is:

1. How easy he/she can get access to the funding (auto loan)
2. How old is his/her current car
3. How good is the new car model

The below chart is sourced from WSJ.

For factor #1, it looks like financial institutions have lowered the bar for approving car loans. According to the credit-monitoring firm Experian, now 20.4% of all auto loans are sub-prime loans, which is granted to borrowers in the lowest credit score range. Banks are even providing longer term loans. Get this, the average long term loan now reaches 5.5 years...

C450 AMG Sport

Last week, Mercedes-Benz announced its plan to debut two new AMG Sport models in next month’s North American International Auto Show, in Detroit. You heard right, not one but TWO.

The two new AMG Sport vehicles we are talking about are the C450 AMG Sport and also the GLE 450 AMG Sport (the GLE class is similar to the BMW X6). Check out the image below of the 2016 Mercedes-AMG C63S. The exterior of the C450 AMG Sport will also share some similar styling, including the quad exhaust tips.

More Information Leaked

The C450 AMG Sport will utilize the same twin-turbo 3...

What happened to Spyker

One of the saddest things a company can say in a press release is probably to announce that they are going bankrupt. This should be exactly the case for Spyker today, as the Dutch auto maker filed a petition for financial restructuring (something similar to Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the US), and was approved by the district court of Midden-Nederland in Lelystad, the Netherlands.

Most people know the name of Spyker from its move of taking over Saab from GM back in 2010. But it looks like running a business to build production passenger car requires a lot of capital, and expertise, which Spyker still needs improvements...

The Latest Ford Shelby GT350

We all know Ford is busy with promoting their latest muscle car of the year: the Shelby GT350 Mustang, while still working on its final production version.

What WASN’T On Shelby’s Press Release

In our previous report two weeks ago during the 2014 LA auto show, we leaked  a few things that you won’t find in Ford’s press release. Today we have MORE info on the GT350 Mustang, below is the summary of what we know so far, but is not in the official press release (new information today highlighted in bold):

1. The 5.2L flat-plane V8 shares the same cylinder block geometry of the 5...