Porsche defers VW majority plans until more favorable economic conditions

Late last month Porsche announced that it had 74.1% control of the Volkswagen Group via a 42.6% direct equity stake and options giving that gave it the additional 31.5%. The sports carmaker also confirmed its previous intention to increase its stake in VW to more than 50% by the end of the year, however, in the latest turn of events Porsche has announced that it will wait until the new year to make any further strategic moves. Referring to the increased share acquisition, Porsche CEO Wendelin Wiedeking said at a conference today that "in light of the current economic environment, it therefore becomes increasingly unrealistic to achieve this goal within 2008." He said the goal remained to raise the voting stake above 50% but there was no rush.