TOKYO/PARIS: Shares in Renault recovered some lost ground on Tuesday after the French carmaker and its Japanese partner Nissan Motor rejected media reports that their alliance was in danger of being dissolved.
Growing concerns about the state of the 20-year old French-Japanese alliance, forged by former boss turned fugitive Carlos Ghosn, had sent Renault and Nissan shares skidding to multi-year lows on Monday.
At the opening of trading in Paris on Tuesday, Renault shares rose 1.3pc, before falling back slightly to trade up 0.49pc by 08:23 GMT.
The alliance, which also includes Japan’s Mitsubishi Motors Corp, is “solid, robust, everything but dead,” the chairman of Renault, Jean-Philippe Senard, told Belgian newspaper L’Echo.
French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire also weighed in, saying reports some executives wanted to break up the alliance were “malicious.”
Speaking to France’s CNews TV, he also said he expected Renault to name a new chief executive within days to replace Thierry Bollore, a Ghosn-era appointee who was ousted in October.
Luca de Meo, who stepped down as the head of Volkswagen’s Seat brand last week, is seen as a frontrunner for the job, although a stringent non-compete clause in his contract firm may prove a hurdle, sources have told Reuters.
