The South Korean automaker Hyundai Motor has been cutting production overseas as a global credit crunch that has savaged the U.S. auto industry extends to Asian car and parts makers.

Jake Jang, a Hyundai spokesman, said Hyundai had cut output at all its overseas production lines except at a new Czech factory. He gave no further details. Hyundai only started test production at the Czech plant early last month.
Hyundai currently runs overseas production lines in the United States, China, Turkey, India and the Czech Republic.
Hyundai posted a 40 percent drop in U.S. November car sales from a year ago, while U.S. sales at Kia, a Hyundai affiliate, fell 37 percent.
Jang said Hyundai had cut its U.S. annual production target to 245,000 units from 260,000 units.
Hyundai has this month stopped overtime work at all its local plants except one that makes compact sedans like the Elantra. Analysts say the overtime ban would trim monthly output by around 20,000 cars.
The global auto industry has been hammered by a sharp drop in demand, particularly in the United States where Ford Motor, General Motors and Chrysler are seeking a total of $34 billion in loans and credit lines from the government.
“This is a survival game. It’s not just carmakers; companies across all sectors cannot help but cut output in the current situation,” said Choi Dae-sik, an analyst at HI Securities in Seoul. “If the problem remains until the first half of next year, it could be the worst period for the auto industry.”
Shares of the car parts maker Hyundai Mobis, an affiliate of Hyundai Motor and its biggest supplier, slid 10.7 percent in Seoul on Wednesday against a wider market that was only 0.05 percent lower.
Hyundai Motor fell a little under 3 percent, and Kia, a Hyundai affiliate, by 1.8 percent.
The pessimism over the auto industry spread to Japan, where Keihin Corp., a parts supplier to Honda, dropped 1.2 percent, against a 1.8 percent rise in the Nikkei 225, after UBS lowered Keihin’s price target and profit forecasts.
U.S. auto sales slumped nearly 37 percent in November from a year earlier to their lowest since 1982, and major automakers said there was no sign that demand in the world’s largest vehicle market would rebound in the next six months.
(Source: international Herald Tribune)