Here comes more bad news from the car industry. In what is shaping up to be the worst year since the financial crisis for the automotive sector, Nissan and Aston Martin have become the latest manufacturers to hit the skids.
At the luxury marque favoured by James Bond, sales forecasts for 2019 have been ripped up thanks to a “challenging external environment” and problems facing the wider economy. The firm hinted at job cuts as a consequence, as it burns down shareholder value faster than 007 goes through its cars.
At Nissan, reports suggest that more than 10,000 job cuts worldwide are being readied, raising concerns for workers at its Sunderland plant. It is not the first time job losses have been mooted here, which would prove incredibly painful.
The Japanese carmaker has unique issues connected to the removal of its chairman, Carlos Ghosn, but the scale of the potential job losses speak to broader challenges in the automotive sector facing both companies.
In Britain the spectre of no-deal Brexit hangs like an exhaust cloud over the industry. After three decades driving up sales for the entire industry, demand in China is falling. The global economy is slowing and the trade war between Washington and Beijing rattles on. Donald Trump could weigh in with US tariffs on EU cars, possibly from as early as the autumn, making matters much worse for carmakers and the economies they operate in.
The car industry has been the motor of the European economy for some time. But the list of immediate woes facing manufacturers is dragging down growth. Germany is flirting with recession, while the added problems from Brexit mean Britain may already be there.
Against such a backdrop, it’s time to buckle up and prepare for the worst. But with Boris Johnson reorganising the deckchairs in Downing Street, little is being done in Britain to soften the car industry crash.
Deutsche Bank could take a pointer from RBS
Moving on from the mess of the 2008 financial crisis was never going to be easy for the world’s biggest banks. Perhaps nowhere more so than at Deutsche Bank, which has failed to grasp the nettle for the best part of a decade.
The scale of the challenge facing Germany’s biggest lender became apparent after it reported a huge €3.1bn (£2.8bn) loss in the second quarter, its second worst since the nadir of the crash.
Much of the losses were from restructuring, accounting for €3.4bn, to for pay redundancies and other costs. Slashing 18,000 jobs worldwide and selling off unwanted assets was never going to come cheap.
For some friendly advice, its chief executive, Christian Sewing, might want to turn to the outgoing boss of Royal Bank of Scotland, Ross McEwan. In banking circles Deutsche has already jokingly been referred to as “RBS with an umlaut”, due to the mess it finds itself in. The bailed-out British bank notched up a decade of losses, mainly due to its own restructuring woes.
Deutsche spent years betting it would be the last big bank in town, hoovering up its rivals’ clients as they cut back. It even had a group of bankers known as the “haggis team” to pick off choice customers from RBS. It was a bet that failed.
Now that the German bank is heading on a similar course, it could learn from RBS how not to make similar mistakes. It will need sage advice on what looks likely to be a long and painful road ahead.
ITV feels twice the love
There is nothing new under the sun. And certainly not at ITV, where executives are betting that two series of Love Island a year will pay dividends.
ITV plans to crack on with a winter edition, filmed in South Africa, of the hit series from next year. Love Island is having its best viewing figures yet, with more than 5 million people watching each episode, so the idea makes sense on paper.
However, laying it on factor-50 thick can only take a concept so far. At some point, viewers’ heads will be turned.
