Opel bankruptcy may be best course of action: German economy minister

Governor Roland Koch of Hesse, where the troubled automaker Opel is headquartered has said that the government must do whatever it can to keep the GM's Opel unit out of bankruptcy. Koch's remarks come ahead of another meeting on the carmaker's future. 

Koch said that it must be the policy of the government to do everything possible to avoid an insolvency.

Koch's comments come in response to economy minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg's remarks that an orderly insolvency of the carmaker would probably be the best course of action to protect taxpayer's money.

A number of bids have been received for the carmaker including offers from Italian carmaker Fiat SpA, Canadian auto parts maker Magna International Inc together with Russia's Sberbank and New York-based firm Ripplewood Holdings LLC.

According to German officials it was up to GM to choose Opel's investor, the government wanted to decide this week on modalities to lend state support to the selected party.

Opel employees number 25,000 which works out to nearly half of GM's European work force.