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Ferrari IPO could come any day now

According to Bloomberg, Fiat Chrysler Automotive Sergio Marchionne told reporters at the Toronto Global Forum that the Ferrari IPO could come any day now. "We are days away from filing the prospectus," said Marchionne, who declined to confirm whether rumors of involvement from UBS Group AG, JPMorgan Chase & Co and Goldman Sachs Group were accurate. In addition to an expected filing in New York, Marchionne hinted that a secondary filing could take place in Milan, Italy. Although the FCA Chief Executive didn't offer any expected sum for Ferrari, he had previously suggested that an IPO for the iconic Italian brand could be worth $1 billion, ringing the registers to the tune of 10 percent of the company's $11 billion valuation. According to Bloomberg, that potential sum is significantly higher than its own internal figures indicate after taking a poll of analysts who we assume must know a heck of a lot more about such things than we do. Considering how close we apparently are to the actual filing, though, we probably won't have to wait long to find out. Another hot topic any time Sergio is the subject of reporter questioning is a potential merger with General Motors or another large, full-line automaker. It seems there aren't any new revelations to reveal on the consolidation front, though Marchionne told reporters there were no plans to mount a hostile takeover of GM or any "other, less optimal" partners. Related Video: News Source: BloombergImage Credit: STR/AFP/Getty Earnings/Financials Chrysler Ferrari Fiat Sergio Marchionne FCA

Marchionne completed Fiat-Chrysler deal from a Florida beach

Sergio Marchionne is the CEO of Fiat, which as you may have heard, has finally worked up a deal to finish acquiring the Chrysler Group after months of bargaining with the United Auto Workers and its VEBA healthcare trust, which owned just over 40 percent of the American brand. Where was Marchionne when the deal was finally hammered out? Well, not tucked away in a frigid Detroit board room until the wee hours of the morning.
Nope, one of the largest deals in automotive history was reportedly hammered out on the beach - at the home of a banker, in the Florida resort town of Vero Beach. Marchionne traveled to the home of Alain Lebec, a senior managing director at Brock Capital LLC, one of the advisory companies for the VEBA fund, where both sides met to make final arrangements in the $4.35-billion exchange. The location of the final deal, though, is nearly as remarkable as the pace with which it came about.
According to anonymous sources pinned down by Automotive News Europe, before the meeting, the two sides were meeting in Detroit as recently as December 19, which is where Fiat made one of its final revised offers. Naturally, the VEBA made a counter offer, which led Marchionne to initiate the Vero Beach meeting.

The Aficianauto sets his lens on Black Beauty

In the short time we've known about the works of The Aficionauto, we've become fans of the video series highlighting some of the most famous and iconic movie/television cars ever. While past episodes featured cars from 1980s movies and tv shows, the latest video shows off the 1965 Chrysler Imperial affectionately known as Black Beauty We saw the Imperial for the first time at the 2009 Comic-Con; the car actually used in the 2011 action comedy The Green Hornet.
Of the 30 cars made for the movie, host Chris Rutkowski says that Sony only preserved two, and if you're a collector of movie cars, this one is currently being sold for $165,000. Scroll down to watch as Rutkowski takes Black Beauty for a spin through Beverly Hills, CA with its assortment of exposed weapons including the hood-mounted machine guns, numerous missiles and flame thrower.