2019 Chrysler Pacifica Touring L Plus on 2040-cars

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This or That: 2005 Chrysler Crossfire SRT6 vs. 1984 Pontiac Fiero

Welcome to another round of This or That, where two Autoblog editors pick a topic, pick a side and pull no punches. Last round pitted yours truly against Associate Editor Brandon Turkus, and my chosen VW Vanagon Syncro narrowly defeated Brandon's 1987 Land Rover. In fact, it was, by far, the closest round we've seen, with 1,907 voters seeing things my way (for 50.8 percent of the vote) versus 1,848 votes for Brandon's Rover (49.2 percent). Sweet, sweet victory! For this latest round of This or That, I've roped Editor Greg Migliore into what I think is a rather fun debate. We've each chosen our favorite terrible cars, setting a price limit of $10,000 to make sure neither of us went too crazy with our automotive atrocities. I think we've both chosen terribly... and I mean that in the best way possible. 2005 Chrysler Crossfire SRT6 Jeremy Korzeniewski: Why It's Terrible: Taken in isolation, the Chrysler Crossfire isn't necessarily a terrible car. In fact, it drives pretty darn well, and there's a lot of solid engineering under its slinky shape. Problem is, that engineering was already rather long in the tooth well before Chrysler ever got its hands on it, having come from Mercedes-Benz, which used the basic chassis and drivetrain in a previous version of its SLK coupe and roadster. Granted, the SLK was an okay car, too, but even when new, it hardly set the world on fire with sporty driving dynamics. Chrysler took these decent-but-no-more bits and pieces from the Mercedes parts bin – remember, this car was conceived in the disastrous Merger Of Equals days – and covered them with a rather attractive hard-candy shell. Unfortunately, the super sporty shape wrote checks in the minds of buyers that its well-worn mechanicals were simply unable to cash, though an injection of power courtesy of a supercharged V6 engine in the SRT6 model, as seen here, certainly helped ease some of those woes. In the end, Chrysler was left with a so-called halo car that looked the part but never quite performed the part. It was almost universally panned by critics as an overpriced parts-bin special, which, I must add, was damningly accurate. As a result, sales were very slow, and within the first few months, dealers were clearancing the car at cut-rate prices, just to keep them from taking up too much of the showroom floor. Why It's Not That Terrible, After All: I can speak from personal experience when discussing the Chrysler Crossfire. You see, I owned one. Well, sort of...

Chrysler nets $1.6B income in Q4, Fiat profit up 5%

Chrysler announced its 2013 financial results today and unveiled its new name and decidedly bank-like logo. Amid the announcement, Chrysler posted big gains in income, while Fiat didn't perform to analysts' expectations.
For 2013, Chrysler had revenue of $72.1 billion, up 10 percent from 2012. Net income reached $2.8 billion, a 65-percent increase. It was the company's third straight year of annual profits.
In terms of unit sales, Chrysler sold 2.4 million cars worldwide in 2013, up 9 percent. According to Automotive News, 1.8 million of those vehicles were sold in the US, a 14-percent increase. The sales growth boosted Chrysler's US market share to 11.4 percent, up 0.2 percent.

Italy reportedly guarantees $7.1 billion loan to Fiat Chrysler

ROME — Italy has approved a decree offering state guarantees for a 6.3-billion euro ($7.1 billion) loan to Fiat Chrysler's (FCA)  Italian unit, a source said, paving the way for the largest crisis loan to a European carmaker. The source said Italy's audit court had signed off on the decree, in a final step of what had been a lengthy and contested process to get the loan approved. The court's approval follows an earlier endorsement by the economy ministry. "The audit court authorized the decree," said a source close to the matter, asking not to be named because of its sensitivity. FCA's Italian division has tapped Rome's COVID-19 emergency financing schemes to secure a state-backed, three-year facility to help the group's operations in the country, as well as Italy's car sector in which about 10,000 businesses operate, weather the crisis triggered by the coronavirus emergency. The loan will be disbursed by Italy's biggest retail bank Intesa Sanpaolo, which has already authorized it pending the approval of guarantees the government will provide on 80% of the sum through export credit agency SACE. The request for state support has sparked controversy because FCA is working to merge with French rival PSA and the holding for the Italian-American carmaker is registered in the Netherlands. FCA's global brands include Fiat, Jeep, Dodge and Maserati. It was not immediately clear what conditions, if any, Italy has set as part of the guarantees and whether they would affect FCA's planned 5.5 billion euro ($6.2 billion) extraordinary dividend, which is a key element in the merger with PSA. FCA, whose shares were down 0.5% by 0908 GMT, had no immediate comment.   Earnings/Financials Chrysler Fiat Peugeot Italy