Fiat said it would not immediately exercise an option to sell the rest of its car business to General Motors (GM) so as to give the two groups more time to find a settlement in their dispute.
Fiat said today - the official start date of the validity of the option - that it would continue a mediation process to try to sort out the spat with GM until February 1st.
"Although the put option is exercisable on January 24th, 2005, Fiat has decided to await the completion of the mediation process," the Italian industrial group said.
"As a result, Fiat will be in a position to exercise the put option from February 2nd, 2005, through to July 24th, 2010."
Under the mediation process, the chief executives of Fiat and GM should meet face-to-face to settle their dispute over the validity of Fiat's option to sell its 90 per cent of Fiat Auto to GM, which owns the rest.
Should they fail, a protracted legal battle is likely, analysts have said.
In its statement this morning, Fiat reaffirmed its position that it did not consider the sale of the financing business of its car arm and a recapitalisation to have invalidated the put option, as claimed by GM.
In separate statement, GM said the mediation relates "to our assertion that Fiat has committed material breaches of the Master Agreement between the companies."