I don't get the lingo. If we know anything about Fiat, it's that the company doesn't actually have any money. It picked up the opportunity to obtain for free a 35-percent stake in a Chrysler rising from its Chapter 11 ashes. And now AP (via The New York Times and the Washington Post) is reporting that Fiat is in discussions to "buy" Opel, General Motors' European brand, based in Germany.

Fiat will not be "buying" Opel. The GM unit needs $4.3 billion to survive, and as with Chrysler, Fiat CEO Sergio Marchinonne's gambit is to pitch Fiat as a willing partner with the German government. He doesn't have a choice, because Fiat's debt situation in onerous, and it's sales have suffered along with everyone else's during the downturn in the car business.

Having pulled Fiat itself back from the brink of bankruptcy, Marchionne is under no illusions about what a global carmaker needs to survive: massive infusions of public cash! He's been thinking about playing with house money all along, anyway, as the Italian government would be under enormous pressure to bail out recapitalize Fiat if the company's financials get any worse. You have to wonder when people are going to stop shaking their heads in disbelief at Marchionne's negotiating moxie and pondering his fashion sense and start talking about him as the canniest business man on Earth.