VW shares fall again

VOLKSWAGEN shares fell another DM7.2 to DM392.30 yesterday following reports in Der Spiegel, the German newsmagazine, that the company is secretly considering the dismissal of Jose Ignacio Lopez de Arriortua, its chief of production and the man at the centre of the industrial espionage row with General Motors.

Der Spiegel alleged that a dozen VW trainees had spent days at the end of March copying papers from Adam Opel, the GM subsidiary, and putting secret data into computers.

VW, which declined to comment, said its parent company had made a DM70m profit in July. VW recorded a DM1.25bn loss in first-quarter 1993 and a DM355m second-quarter loss.

Klaus Liesen, chairman of Volkswagen's supervisory board, is interrupting his holiday to handle the espionage crisis.