They would not "axe" the Viper as they are actively seeking a new owner for the brand.
What's scary is they cannot find a buyer for the "low low" price of $80 million. Viper has been "for sale" since last August.
As for "non performing assets", think of "closed factories" and other properties that Chrsyler owns but are not using.
What's not clear to me is what's included in that $80 million price. That's a really low price, and might just be the brand and goodwill? I'd think that if they lumped all the tooling, factory, real estate, etc., into it the price would be closer to the $300 million mark.
Even if they're selling for a low price like that for the whole operation, these things can take a lot of time. They probably hoped to get the deal done by end of December, but this marketplace got very dodgy (pun intended) between August and Dec. Now, there's probably no big hurry to get it done until end of '09 production run next December. $80 million is just a round-off error in the grand scheme of things right now, so if I were Chrysler (Cerberus) I wouldn't be too motivated to move it - especially now that they've already submitted their viability plan. At this point, what happens happens and there isn't too much pressure to get rid of Viper. In fact, with recent interest, there might even be some thoughts about keeping it...
