Volkswagen AG will take a surprise charge of about 2.5 billion euros ($3 billion) in the third quarter as plans to buy back or retrofit tainted U.S. diesel cars proves more complex than expected, bringing total damages from the two-year-old scandal to over 25 billion euros. The charge will wipe out more than half of Volkswagen’s projected 4.45 billion euros in earnings for the period, according to three analyst estimates compiled by Bloomberg.
The sizable increase to VW’s financial woes comes a full 15 months after the company reached a settlement with U.S. authorities to either buy back or retrofit around 500,000 tainted vehicles, including Golf, Jetta and Audi A3 models. Volkswagen on Friday said the plans were turning out to take significantly longer and were technically much tougher than anticipated. The complications, which the company didn’t specify in detail, amount to about 5,000 euros per car.
Article source: http://www.dailystar.com.lb//Business/International/2017/Sep-30/421049-vws-diesel-woes-reach-30-billion-after-surprise-us-hit.ashx