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Crunch watch Dec 08: the auto industry in crisis

By Tim Pollard and Simon Stiel Motor Industry 31 December 2008 14:05 Wednesday 31 December 2008• GMAC, GM's finance arm, said it would immediately revise its criteria for providing loans, after the US government bail-out of the General's credit arm. It will now supply credit for anyone with a score of 621 or more on the Fico scale, the scale used to assess Amercian customers' creditworthiness (Financial Times)• The news means that 80% of US consumers would now qualify for a loan from GMAC – which should improve sales in the depressed US market (Detroit News)• Chrysler is being lambasted for taking out full-page adverts in the American national press thanking the nation for supporting its auto industry. But critics point out this is a fresh waste of bail-out resources, as pages in the Wall Street Journal – one of the titles in which the ad ran – reportedly cost up to $264,000.

Honda Fit gets new color for 2013, base price stays the same

The 2013 Honda Fit carries a base sticker price of $16,115 including $790 destination—the same as that of the 2012 model—when it arrives in dealerships on Tuesday. Changes for 2013 consist of a new exterior color, named midnight plum pearl. The orange burst metallic paint is canceled.

Hiromu Naruse: ‘Godfather’ of the LFA ‘Not Famous Enough’

Hiromu Naruse & Lexus LFA Last year we reported the death of Hiromu Naruse, Toyota’s chief test driver and a man considered to be the ‘Godfather’ of the Japanese performance car, and particularly the Lexus LFA, a car which consumed the last decade of his life and became the final testament to his enormous skill. At 67, Naruse-san was still as involved as ever, and it was whilst driving a Lexus LFA with the Nurburgring Package he met his end on a public road near the Nurburgring. A track, incidentally, he had driven more than any other Japanese driver.