Content area
Full Text
A new and much bigger GM Financial is emerging this year -- a global, mostly prime-risk auto lender that looks a lot like the old GMAC captive finance company.
In a mirror image of sorts, a new Ally Financial is emerging this year, too. The new Ally is smaller and its auto finance and insurance operation is now limited to the United States. It also has a strong online consumer banking business.
In many ways, the two financial institutions have traded places. GM Financial, a one-time niche player in auto finance, has evolved into a globe-circling behemoth. Ally Financial, which as GMAC was once so large that the U.S. government felt compelled to rescue it rather than let it fail, today is a much smaller operation focused on a smaller number of core businesses.
Doubled in size
GM Financial used to be known as AmeriCredit Corp. At the time, it was a publicly traded independent auto-finance company that specialized in the subprime market.
Then, in 2010, GM acquired AmeriCredit, setting it on a transformational path toward becoming GM's worldwide captive finance company.
The biggest changes are only...