Loss at GM’s Opel Unit Is Expected to Widen for ’04

General Motors Corp.’s German division, Adam Opel, will widen its operating loss to about 500 million euros ($681 million) for 2004, a company source said Wednesday.

“The operating loss for 2004 will be very much bigger than last year’s -- in the region of 500 million euros,� the source said. Opel had an operating loss of 384 million euros in 2003.

An Opel spokesman declined to comment on the report.

He said that starting with 2004’s figures, Opel would no longer report its results separately from those of GM Europe.

Opel accounts for 80% to 85% of GM’s European sales. Sweden’s Saab and Britain’s Vauxhall are the other GM units in Europe, where the world’s biggest carmaker has been posting losses since 1999.

GM is slashing its European workforce by one-fifth over the next two years in an attempt to save at least half a billion euros.

In Germany, Opel will lose about 9,500 of its 32,000 jobs.

GM wants to build its next generation of mid-size cars, the Opel Vectra and the Saab 9-3, in a single European plant. It is considering its factory in Ruesselsheim, Germany, and one in Trollhaettan, Sweden.

GM shares Wednesday rose 30 cents to $40.27 on the New York Stock Exchange.