The discussion regarding oils issues leads us to another important area, which is the car industry. Generally, auto companies reported notable developments and expansions during this week. Last Wednesday, Nanjing Automobile acquired the MG Rover plant at Longbridge, England for a 33 year lease from St. Modwen Properties Plc. The leading Chinese auto maker is said to have paid 1.8 M pounds for the 105 acre factory. Nanjing surprised the global car industry last July 2005 when it bought MG rover for around 53 M pounds thus outbidding its fellow Chinese competitor, Shanghai Automotive Corp. The big move is part of the company's vision to become one of the leading car brands in the world.

Honda Motors Co. is also getting more attention form the international auto market after it disclosed its plans to produce a hybrid yet low priced version of its Fit subcompact. The car maker intends to release the hybrid design next year. Honda representatives, nevertheless, clarified that the hybrid technology will be distributed only at a lower scale. This is due to the design's very expensive production cost. However, Honda is also developing smaller battery and motors that would help reduce the hybrid cost in the future. This venture is part of Honda's goal to beat the problem of high-gasoline consumption through specially designed automobiles. Aside from Honda, other companies that have joined the market for hybrid cars are Ford and Toyota.

Based on its recent report, Ford Motor Co. has dropped down in its sales by 4% last month. Another company that has followed the same trend is General Motors. According to GM, its sales also decreased by 2.5%. Meanwhile, the total sales of both Toyota and DaimlerChrysler continued to improve this year. Particularly, the Chrysler Group jumped in its sales by 3% of around 190,367 cars. Some of the most popular automobiles sold by the company are: Dodge automobiles, Chrysler, and Jeep. Chrysler's Mercedes-Benz also improved by 28%. Toyota reported that its sales within the U.S alone rose by 2.4% to around 166,940 cars last February.

Although Ford's sales on Jaguar have decreased last year, the auto maker declared that it has no plans of selling Jaguar. Ford bought the famous car brand back in 1989 for around 1.6B pounds. This year, the car company is positive that Jaguar sales is going to recover and improve. Ford is also set to release a new car model that would be hitting Europe soon. This is part of its strategy to keep up with the strong competition against other auto giants especially those that come from Asia.