The plant was killed because it was old (it was built in 1981) and increasingly marginalised by industry demand for high-technology, aluminium-block engines that it could not supply. Production was running at about a third of its peak by the time GM pulled the plug.
There will be a fairly limited flow-through effect to the economy, but the closure is a reminder that exporters are being squeezed by the strong Australian dollar, even as the domestic economy comes off the boil.
This week's news that the Australian economy had grown by a surprisingly strong 3.6% grabbed the headlines, but it was the 0.6% increase in the March quarter that pointed forward, to a sub-par growth rate of about 2.5%.
And the post-March pointers are weak: retail sales fell by 0.2% in April to be basically flat in the first four months of the year, for example, and some news on trading conditions since then came yesterday from whitegoods and appliance retailer Clive Peeters. In February it said that earnings in the year to June would probably beat last year's $13.5 million result by about 10%. Yesterday it said earnings would be more like $10.2 million.
The retailer said trading was on track in the first two months of the year, but slowed in March, deteriorated sharply in April and got even worse in May, despite an advertising blitz.
For investors looking for resources shares to compensate for weakening industrials, developments in that sector this week were also a bit worrying.
The key development was US Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke's unexpected ride to the assistance of the US dollar, which has declined by 15% against the euro in a year, and by 24% since the beginning of 2006.
Bernanke said on Tuesday that the Fed was monitoring the greenback's slide and its potential to spur inflation in the US, and would continue to guard against "an erosion in longer-term inflation expectations".
By the end of the week, a tug of war had emerged, with the European Central Bank leaving its key rate unchanged but signalling that it could defend the euro by raising rates next month.
But if Bernanke backs up his words and tries to defend the dollar, commodity prices will be undermined — because a higher dollar translates arithmetically to lower prices for all the $US denominated commodities, and because the only realistic way for Bernanke to get the dollar higher is to either hold US rates where they are, or raise them, pulling down on economic activity in the process.
Commodity prices rallied yesterday on the prospect of European rates rising, but they are off their highs. Gold is down 12.3% since March 18, copper is down 10% since April 9, and even after jumping $US5.49 to $US127.79 yesterday, oil is off its May 21 high of $US132.57.
IT'S not uncommon for bidders to talk down the profit prospects of an unwilling target during a takeover battle. Spotless did it with its bid for Programmed Maintenance Services, and Solomon Lew's Premier Investments is doing it with Just Group, arguing that its bid for the retailer is full value, given the retail downturn.
It's much rarer for a bidder to actually back up the talk by walking — but that's what Spotless did yesterday, announcing that it would allow its offer to lapse, because Programmed's earnings before interest and tax of $54.4 million for the year to March had breached a bid condition that the result be at least $56 million.
The offer will run for another week, until Friday, but the enforcement of the profit condition cannot be reversed, and all acceptances will be returned.
The bid was intended to signal a new era for Spotless under the leadership of Peter "Pacman" Smedley, who took over as chairman early last year, reformed the board, and appointed a new chief executive-in-waiting, Jo Farnik.
But Spotless was making no headway with its shares-and-cash offer, and its concern about Programmed's profit result was real. The result was about 10% below analysts' expectations, and the main earnings weakness was in Programmed's original property maintenance business, which was where Spotless was planning to book $18 million of merger synergies.
Spotless might have been able to break through by boosting either the total value of its offer or sweetening it, by changing the cash and shares mix to include more cash. But even on the existing terms, it would have taken about three years for the deal to go earnings-per-share positive.
Spotless has been a chronic sharemarket underperformer, and after it launched this bid it fielded some feedback from its shareholders that it had moved too early, using scrip for currency that had not yet re-rated to reflect the changes that Smedley is expected to produce, and therefore paying more than it might in a year or two, when the shares should have a more powerful exchange rate.
That probably also influenced yesterday's decision, and investors certainly seemed to think that Spotless had made the right call. The group's shares jumped by 29¢, or 10%, to $3.20 on the news.
Programmed's shares came under pressure this week as it became more likely that the bid would fail, falling from $4.91 to $4.50 between Monday and Thursday, and losing another 19¢ to $4.31 yesterday.
Commodity prices rallied yesterday on the prospect of European rates rising, but they are off their highs. Gold is down 12.3% since March 18, copper is down 10% since April 9, and even after jumping $US5.49 to $US127.79 yesterday, oil is off its May 21 high of $US132.57.
IT'S not uncommon for bidders to talk down the profit prospects of an unwilling target during a takeover battle. Spotless did it with its bid for Programmed Maintenance Services, and Solomon Lew's Premier Investments is doing it with Just Group, arguing that its bid for the retailer is full value, given the retail downturn.
It's much rarer for a bidder to actually back up the talk by walking — but that's what Spotless did yesterday, announcing that it would allow its offer to lapse, because Programmed's earnings before interest and tax of $54.4 million for the year to March had breached a bid condition that the result be at least $56 million.
The offer will run for another week, until Friday, but the enforcement of the profit condition cannot be reversed, and all acceptances will be returned.
The bid was intended to signal a new era for Spotless under the leadership of Peter "Pacman" Smedley, who took over as chairman early last year, reformed the board, and appointed a new chief executive-in-waiting, Jo Farnik.
But Spotless was making no headway with its shares-and-cash offer, and its concern about Programmed's profit result was real. The result was about 10% below analysts' expectations, and the main earnings weakness was in Programmed's original property maintenance business, which was where Spotless was planning to book $18 million of merger synergies.
Spotless might have been able to break through by boosting either the total value of its offer or sweetening it, by changing the cash and shares mix to include more cash. But even on the existing terms, it would have taken about three years for the deal to go earnings-per-share positive.
Spotless has been a chronic sharemarket underperformer, and after it launched this bid it fielded some feedback from its shareholders that it had moved too early, using scrip for currency that had not yet re-rated to reflect the changes that Smedley is expected to produce, and therefore paying more than it might in a year or two, when the shares should have a more powerful exchange rate.
That probably also influenced yesterday's decision, and investors certainly seemed to think that Spotless had made the right call. The group's shares jumped by 29¢, or 10%, to $3.20 on the news.
Programmed's shares came under pressure this week as it became more likely that the bid would fail, falling from $4.91 to $4.50 between Monday and Thursday, and losing another 19¢ to $4.31 yesterday.
