Cordes Sells Shares in DaimlerChrysler

Eckard Cordes, head of DaimlerChrysler's Mercedes Car division, sold a big packet of shares in the German-US parent company last week, it emerged on Tuesday, in another sign that he is likely to quit. Cordes exercised an option to buy 92,500 DaimlerChrysler shares last Friday and then immediately sold the shares at a price of 479,150 euros ($584,563), a mandatory filing by the German-US auto giant revealed. The day before, the shock announcement that DaimlerChrysler chief executive Juergen Schrempp planned to quit by the end of this year had pushed the group's share price up by more than 10 percent on the Frankfurt stock exchange. Cordes' future is still not decided. The manager, a close ally of Schrempp, had been tipped to take the driving seat at DaimlerChrysler in 2008. But the car-maker's supervisory board appointed arch-rival Dieter Zetsche as Schrempp's successor instead. In response, Cordes asked the board to relieve him of his duties after less than a year on the job.