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10-K: FORD MOTOR CREDIT CO LLC
                                                       
                  Last update: 6:32 a.m. EST Feb. 26, 2009
                       
                                                     (EDGAR Online via COMTEX) -- ITEM 7. MANAGEMENT'S DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL CONDITION AND RESULTS OF OPERATIONS Overview Our primary objective remains to profitably and consistently support the sale of Ford, Lincoln, Mercury, and Volvo vehicles. Meeting this objective in 2008 was more difficult due to: the adverse impact of the worldwide credit crisis on the capital markets; a decline in consumer confidence and spending; a decline in used vehicle auction values; higher repossessions; and the impact of our declining receivables on our ability to maintain a competitive cost structure. Despite these challenges, we have been able to fund our business and support the sale of Ford vehicles. We have accomplished this by: using our committed liquidity programs and government-sponsored funding programs in the United States and Europe; reducing our receivables; maintaining consistent risk management practices; and restructuring our business to maintain a competitive cost structure. The Challenging Economic Environment Consistent with the overall market, we have been impacted by volatility and disruptions in the capital markets since August 2007, particularly the asset-backed securities market where we obtain the majority of our funding. We now face the increased challenges of the global credit crisis, including reduced access to capital markets, increases in the credit spreads associated with our funding, higher renewal costs for our committed liquidity programs, greater enhancements for our securitizations, and a reduction in our capacity to obtain derivatives to manage market risk, including interest rate risk. Declining consumer confidence and increasing unemployment have contributed to lower consumer spending and reduced vehicle demand. Sales of new vehicles in the United States declined about 20% in 2008 compared with 2007. Significant increases in gasoline prices in the first half of 2008 contributed to this decline. These price increases resulted in lower demand for full-size trucks and traditional sport utility vehicles, which also resulted in lower used vehicle auction values. These lower values contributed to an impairment charge to our North America operating lease portfolio and significant increases to our provision for credit losses. Our provision for credit losses also increased due to higher repossessions in our retail installment and lease portfolio. Our Response Most of our funding during the second half of 2008 was completed through our committed liquidity programs and government-sponsored funding programs due to limited access to public and private securitization markets. Through December 31, 2008, we sold $7 billion of FCAR Owner Trust retail securitization program ("FCAR") asset-backed commercial paper to the U.S. Federal Reserve's Commercial Paper Funding Facility ("CPFF"). In addition, as of December 31, 2008, FCE Bank plc ("FCE") accessed $1.1 billion of short-term funding under the European Central Bank's ("ECB") open market operations program under which obligations are backed by either notes or receivables. We plan to continue utilizing existing government-sponsored funding programs (i.e., CPFF and ECB) and expect to use new programs for which we are eligible (e.g., Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility - "TALF"). For additional information on our use of these programs, refer to the "Funding" and "Liquidity" sections of Item 7 of Part II of our 10-K Report. Our funding requirements have decreased as managed receivables declined to $118 billion at December 31, 2008 from $148 billion at year-end 2007. In 2008, as part of our commitment to support the sale of Ford vehicles, Jaguar, Land Rover, and Mazda began to transition their financing to other sources. We also continued our strategy to execute divestitures and alternative business arrangements in certain international markets where securitization and other funding availability was limited. Additionally, lower global automotive industry sales resulted in fewer originations of receivables. We will continue to explore alternative business arrangements and divestitures. For additional information on our divestitures in 2008, refer to Note 14 of our Notes to the Financial Statements. For our retail and lease business, our primary focus is on retail installment sale financing. While we continue to offer leasing to customers who prefer this product, lower auction values and the present funding environment have made leasing less economical for us, Ford, and our customers. This has contributed to a reduction in our lease originations and over time will reduce our residual risk exposure. 
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                                                  Item 7. Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results            
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                                                  Item 7. Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results            
                                    the extent to which we purchase retail installment sale and lease contracts and the extent to which we provide wholesale financing; 
                                                      the sales price of the vehicles financed;            
                                                      the level of dealer inventories;            
                                                       Ford-sponsored special-rate financing programs available exclusively through us; and            
                                    the availability of cost-effective funding for the purchase of retail installment sale and lease contracts and to provide wholesale financing. 
                                    For finance receivables, financing margin equals the difference between revenue earned on finance receivables and the cost of borrowed funds. For operating leases, financing margin equals revenue earned on operating leases, less depreciation expense and the cost of borrowed funds. Interest rates earned on most receivables and rental charges on operating leases generally are fixed at the time the contracts are originated. On some receivables, primarily wholesale financing, we charge interest at a floating rate that varies with changes in short-term interest rates. 
                                    Securitized off-balance sheet basis - includes receivables sold in securitization transactions that, when sold, do not remain on our balance sheet; 
                                    Managed basis - includes on-balance sheet receivables, excluding unearned interest supplements related to finance receivables, and securitized off-balance sheet receivables that we continue to service; and 
                                    Serviced basis - includes managed receivables and leases, and receivables sold in whole-loan sale transactions where we retain no interest in the sold receivables, but which we continue to service. 
                                    We analyze our financial performance primarily on a managed and on-balance sheet basis. We retain interests in receivables sold in off-balance sheet securitizations and, with respect to subordinated retained interests, we have credit risk. As a result, we evaluate credit losses, receivables, and leverage on a managed basis as well as on an on-balance sheet basis. In contrast, we do not have the same financial interest in the performance of receivables sold in whole-loan sale transactions, and as a result, we generally review the performance of our serviced portfolio only to evaluate the effectiveness of our origination and collection activities. To evaluate the performance of these activities, we monitor a number of measures, such as delinquencies, repossession statistics, losses on repossessions, and the number of bankruptcy filings. We measure the performance of our North America Segment and our International Segment primarily on an income before income taxes basis, after excluding the impact to earnings from gains and losses related to market valuation adjustments to derivatives primarily related to movements in interest rates, because our risk management activities are carried out on a centralized basis at the corporate level, with only certain elements allocated to our two segments. For additional information regarding our segments, see Note 18 of our Notes to the Financial Statements. 
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                                                  Item 7. Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results            
                                                       Return volume - Our projection of the number of vehicles that will be returned at lease-end; and            
                                    Discount rate - Our estimation of the discount rate, reflecting hypothetical market assumptions regarding borrowing rates, credit loss patterns, and residual value risk. 
                                    At the time of the impairment, we estimated that a one percent decrease in the auction value of the impaired vehicles assumed in the impairment testing would have decreased the fair value estimate by about $50 million. A one percentage point increase in the return rate of the impaired vehicles assumed in the impairment testing would have decreased the fair value estimate by about $30 million. A one percentage point increase in the discount rate assumed in the impairment testing would have decreased the fair value estimate by about $100 million. 
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                                                  Item 7. Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results            
                                                      A higher provision for credit losses (about $1.2 billion); and            
                                                      Higher depreciation expense for leased vehicles (about $700 million).            
                                                  Other factors to explain the decrease in pre-tax earnings included:            
                                                       Higher net losses related to market valuation adjustments to derivatives (about $200 million); and            
                                    The non-recurrence of the gain related to the sale of a majority of our interest in AB Volvofinans (about $100 million); 
                                                  These factors were offset partially by:            
                                    The non-recurrence of costs associated with our North American business transformation initiative (about $200 million); 
                                                       Lower expenses primarily reflecting improved operating costs (about $300 million); and            
                                    A gain related to the sale of approximately half of our ownership interest in our Nordic operations (about $100 million). 
                                    In 2008 and 2007, pre-tax earnings included net losses related to market valuation adjustments to derivatives (unallocated risk management in the table below) of $317 million and $108 million, respectively. 
                                                                                Full Year
                                                                                           2008
                                                                                       Over/(Under)
                                                    2008              2007                 2007
                                                                  (in millions)
Income/(Loss) before income taxes
North America Segment                             $  (2,749 )    $           701      $       (3,450 )
International Segment                                   507                  622                (115 )
Unallocated risk management                            (317 )               (108 )              (209 )
Income/(Loss) before income taxes                    (2,559 )              1,215              (3,774 )
Provision for/(Benefit from) income taxes,
Minority interests in net income of
subsidiaries, and Gain on disposal of
discontinued operations                              (1,023 )                440              (1,463 )
Net income/(loss)                                 $  (1,536 )    $           775      $       (2,311 )
                          The decrease in North America Segment pre-tax earnings primarily reflected the second quarter 2008 impairment charge for operating leases, a higher provision for credit losses, higher depreciation expense for leased vehicles, and lower contract volume. These factors were offset partially by higher financing margin, the non-recurrence of costs associated with our business transformation initiative, and lower expenses primarily reflecting improved operating costs. The decrease in International Segment pre-tax earnings primarily reflected lower volume and financing margin, a higher provision for credit losses, the non-recurrence of a gain related to the sale of a majority of our interest in AB Volvofinans, and higher reserves for residual based products, offset partially by gains related to the sale of our ownership interests in several operations, lower operating costs, and changes in currency exchange rates. 
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                                                  Item 7. Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results            
                                                       Lower financing margin primarily related to higher borrowing costs (about $400 million);            
                                    Unfavorable lease residual performance reflected in higher depreciation expense for leased vehicles (about $400 million); and 
                                    Higher other costs primarily due to our North American business transformation initiative (about $100 million). 
                                                  These factors were offset partially by:            
                                                       Lower net losses related to market valuation adjustments to derivatives (about $300 million).            
                                    In 2007 and 2006, pre-tax earnings included net losses related to market valuation adjustments to derivatives (unallocated risk management in the table below) of $108 million and $448 million, respectively. 
                                                                                Full Year
                                                                                           2007
                                                                                       Over/(Under)
                                                    2007              2006                 2006
                                                                  (in millions)
Income before income taxes
North America Segment                             $     701      $         1,729      $       (1,028 )
International Segment                                   622                  672                 (50 )
Unallocated risk management                            (108 )               (448 )               340
Income before income taxes                            1,215                1,953                (738 )
Provision for income taxes, Minority interests
in net income of subsidiaries and Gain on
disposal of discontinued operations                     440                  670                (230 )
Net income                                        $     775      $         1,283      $         (508 )
                          The decrease in North America Segment pre-tax earnings primarily reflected higher provision for credit losses primarily related to the non-recurrence of credit loss reserve reductions, unfavorable lease residual performance as reflected in higher depreciation expense for leased vehicles, lower financing margin primarily related to higher borrowing costs and the costs associated with our business transformation initiative. These factors were offset partially by lower expenses, primarily reflecting improved operating costs. 
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          Item 7. Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results
of Operations (Continued)
Placement Volume and Financing Share
Total worldwide financing contract placement volumes for new and used vehicles
are shown below:
                                                         Full Year
                                               2008        2007        2006
                                                      (in thousands)
            North America Segment
            United States                       1,043       1,256       1,574
            Canada                                149         186         189
            Total North America Segment         1,192       1,442       1,763
            International Segment
            Europe                                629         696         711
            Other international                   129         207         233
            Total International Segment           758         903         944
            Total contract placement volume     1,950       2,345       2,707
                          Shown below are our financing shares of new Ford, Lincoln and Mercury brand vehicles sold by dealers in the United States and new Ford brand vehicles sold by dealers in Europe. Also shown below are our wholesale financing shares of new Ford, Lincoln and Mercury brand vehicles acquired by dealers in the United States, excluding fleet, and of new Ford brand vehicles acquired by dealers in Europe: 
                                                                         Full Year
                                                       2008      2007      2006
         United States
         Financing share - Ford, Lincoln and Mercury
         Retail installment and lease                     39 %      38 %      44 %
         Wholesale                                        77        78        80
         Europe
         Financing share - Ford
         Retail installment and lease                     28 %      26 %      27 %
         Wholesale                                        98        96        95
                                        North America Segment            
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          Item 7. Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results
of Operations (Continued)
Financial Condition
Finance Receivables and Operating Leases
Our receivable levels are shown below:
. . .
                                        Feb 26, 2009            
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A higher provision for credit losses (about $1.2 billion)