STUTTGART, Germany (Reuters) - German carmaker Daimler will scrap its 2009 dividend, for the first time in 14 years, after it swung to a worse-than-expected net loss, sending its shares into a tailspin.
It promised to post a 2010 operating profit of more than 2.3 billion euros ($3.12 billion) after charges helped push its 2009 loss to 1.51 billion euros.
DAIMLER <:DCX.XE:>expects to boost group vehicle sales this year amid a 3-4 percent overall gain in global car demand and moderate growth in truck markets.
"Following a significant (20 percent) decrease in 2009,the Daimler Group assumes that its revenue will rise again this year, but will still be significantly lower than in 2008," when turnover reached 98.5 billion euros, the company said.
Daimler shares sank more than 8 percent to their lowest point since September 2009 before paring losses slightly, not helped by the scrapping of a dividend, when analysts' median forecast had banked on 0.50 euro a share.
Daimler Chief Executive Dieter Zetsche, whose contract was extended on Wednesday, may have retained the confidence of his board but he still has to put out a number of fires before he can focus on developing a coherent strategy for the longer term.
Together with the new head of production at Mercedes, Wolfgang Bernhard, the Daimler duo will look to slash billions more in costs as they aim to lift the premium car division's operating margin to 10 percent.
Mercedes is losing out both to larger rival BMW
One solution under discussion is teaming up with Renault
Daimler's problems with its commercial vehicles business also continue.
Although Daimler can maximize economies of scale better than any other rival thanks to its industry-leading volumes, it has repeatedly taken restructuring charges at its North American or Asian operations.
Smaller rival Paccar
($1=.7377 Euro)
(Reporting by Christiaan Hetzner, editing by Will Waterman)
