SHARE
COPY LINK

SAAB

Spyker withdraws funds from Saab offshoot

Dutch firm Spyker has declared its intention to cover its losses by taking funds from Saab GB, arguing that the firm is not a Saab subsidiary but an independent company bought from US General Motors.

“Spyker is not taking any money from Saab, this is an independent company which we are buying from GM,” said Saab Automobile chairperson and Spyker CEO Victor Muller on Monday.

Spyker Cars is leaking money, with the niche sports carmaker reporting a loss of 220 million kronor ($30 million) in 2009, three times the value of its sales.

To cover its massive losses, the firm now wants to create a so-called cash pool with the British distribution firm Saab GB, enabling Spyker to borrow money for its business, according to a TV4 report.

The detail was included in a footnote in Spyker Cars annual accounts.

“We are not hiding anything. It is clearly stated in our financial statement,” Muller told news agency TT.

Saab GB is currently owned by US General Motors (GM) and is set to be acquired by Spyker Cars for the sum of £1 ($1.5).

“We don’t see anything strange in this. We have said all along that no money will move from Saab to Spyker Cars. And it does not in this case either. Saab GB is a completely independent firm which Saab does not own,” Victor Muller said.

Spyker Cars has until July 15th to hand over the outstanding 175 million kronor to GM to complete the purchase of Saab. Swedish rules prohibit buying a firm with its own cash and Muller argues that the latest move is not in breach of these regulations.

But Lennart Ihredal of the professional institute for authorized public accountants (FAR) said the set-up could test the limits of what is acceptable.

“You would then have to look at the regulations in place in the various countries. But in an acquisition such as this I would have it on the check list, so that you don’t breach any regulations,” Ihredal told TV4.

Member comments

Log in here to leave a comment.
Become a Member to leave a comment.

CARS

Former Swedish Saab bosses appear in court

Swedish car maker Saab's former CEO Jan Åke Jonsson and the firm's former head lawyer Kristina Geers have appeared in court in Vänersborg in west Sweden, accused of falsifying financial documents shortly before the company went bankrupt in 2011.

Former Swedish Saab bosses appear in court
Saab's former CEO Jan Åke Jonsson. Photo: Karin Olander/TT
The pair are accused of falsifying the paperwork at the height of the Swedish company's financial difficulties at the start of the decade.
 
A third person – who has not been named in the Swedish media – is accused of assisting them by issuing false invoices adding up to a total of 30 million kronor ($3.55m).
 
According to court documents, the charges relate to the firm's business in Ukraine and the paperwork in question was signed just before former CEO Jan Åke Jonsson resigned.
 
Both Jonsson and Saab's former head lawyer Kristina Geers have admitted signing the papers but denied knowledge of the Ukranian firm implicated in the case.
 
All three suspects deny all the charges against them.
 

Saab's former head lawyer Kristina Geers. Photo:  Björn Larsson Rosvall/TT
 
Saab filed for bankruptcy at the end of 2011, after teetering on the edge of collapse for nearly two years.
 
Chief prosecutor Olof Sahlgren told the court in Vänersborg on Wednesday that the alleged crimes took place in March 2011, when Saab was briefly owned by the Dutch company Spyker Cars.
  
It was eventually bought by National Electric Vehicle Sweden (Nevs), a Chinese-owned company after hundreds of staff lost their jobs.
 
The car maker, which is based in west Sweden, has struggled to resolve serious financial difficulties by attracting new investors since the takeover.
 
In October 2014 it announced it had axed 155 workers, close to a third of its workforce.
 
Since 2000, Saab automobile has had no connection with the defence and aeronautics firm with the same name. It only produces one model today, the electric 9-3 Aero Sedan, mainly targeting the Chinese market.