DETROIT -- In the wake of a $123 million loss in the second quarter, Ford Motor Co. needs larger cost cuts and needs them faster, CEO Bill Ford told The Detroit News in an interview published Friday.
Bill Ford did not tell the newspaper where the cuts will be made, but he noted that the moves will be detailed over the next two months.
The cuts will come on top of plans to close 14 plants and cut 30,000 jobs over the next six years in North America as part of the Way Forward plan announced in January.
The automaker gave a clue last week that the second-quarter financial results would be disappointing when it cut the quarterly stock dividend in half to 5 cents a share and cut in half the fees paid to members of the board of directors.
The urgency is there because sales of trucks are dropping faster as gasoline prices hang around the $3-a-gallon mark.
The fuel-thirsty but high-profit vehicles are the core of Ford Motor's vehicle lineup.
Also on Thursday, July 20, Ford said it cut production plans for the third quarter by 5.6 percent to 670,000 vehicles. All of the cuts were in truck production.
The automaker has had sales success with the Ford Fusion/Mercury Milan/Lincoln Zephyr line of sedans, but it makes less profit on those sales compared with Ford Explorer SUVs and F-series pickups.
Ford Motor's next two major vehicle launches are the Ford Edge/Lincoln MKX crossovers and the redesigned versions of the Ford Expedition/Lincoln Navigator full-sized SUVs.
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