Are the Fiat/DCX, Porsche/VW deals still in limbo?
 

Last I heard, DCX or Fiat had to pay the "gubment" loan back before the buyout could take place.

On the Porsche/VW merger, I heard that Porsche tried to buy VW first, but something happened blahbitty blah. Now VW/Audi is merging with Porsche or something like that.

What da deal?

Porsche/VW wont be complete till 2011. You are correct Porsche tried to buy them and when their sales dropped they nearly went bankrupt!

Fiat currently has a 20% stake in Chrysler when certain "incentives" are met this can increase to 35%. They can NOT own a majority stake of Chrysler until the "gubment" loans are paid back.

Fiat does have management control of Chrysler

Now is the 2011 Porsche/VW deal a buyout or a merger?

Real reason that I ask is that I'm a huge Porsche fan, and while I know that VW/Porsche have always had a good deal of "sharing" I'm worried about VW big wigs possibly effing with the Porsche formula.

The reason I'm interested in the Fiat buyout is I'm wondering which direction the Viper/SRT-10 is going to be headed and I'm really interested to see the Fiat 500 make it's way over here.

It's a buy. VW already said they would make Porsche refocus on core products... and that supposedly meant getting rid of Cayenne and the Panamera. Interesting if that is true since Cayenne makes a lot of money and Panamera is fairly new.

You should be the least worried about that. The reason Porsche wanted to buy VW in the first place was because it wanted access to some of VW's technology, specifically pertaining to SUVs and AWD systems. VW didn't want that, and they didn't want the buy out. So when Porsche nearly tanked, they "bought" it, but I am sketchy on the details of the deal.

VW, on the other hand, said it will be returning Porsche to its roots. Meaning no Cayenne, and no Panaramera.

So, VW owning Porsche is the best thing to happen to Porsche for real Porsche lovers.

Coolbeanz, I never liked the Cayenne or Panamera (though I do think it's neat) much anyway.

As far as the Viper, I think the last I heard was that it was dead. They left the door open for it to come back eventually, but that the current version would wind down with no immediate successor or next generation Viper planned as of yet.