General Motors will sell its stake in PSA Peugeot Citroën, as the French carmaker and Chinese state-owned carmaker Dongfeng move closer to a shareholder and industrial partnership.
The US carmaker took a 7 per cent stake in Peugeot last year as part of an alliance designed to help both companies through the worst European car market for two decades, but was not willing to pump more money into the French carmaker as its finances worsened.
GM, far larger than Peugeot and far less reliant on the moribund European market, said it would sell its entire holding – the second largest stake in Peugeot – through a private placement to institutional investors hours after giving its support to Peugeot’s plans to seek investment from Dongfeng.