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Runtime: 11:26
0:00 Hindenburg Research Announces It’s Disbanding
1:04 ACEA Practically Begging EU to Rethink Emission Rules
1:56 Chinese Automakers Want to Buy VW Plants
2:55 NADA Promises to Fight Direct Sales
3:49 KargoBot Gets Autonomous Platooning Approval
5:25 China’s Jetour Aims to Take on Land Rover & Jeep
6:27 Stellantis Shipments Decline
7:05 Renault Group Increases Its Global Sales
7:45 Honda’s American Sales Up
8:33 Honda Wants Nissan to Buy Renault’s Nissan Shares
9:22 Nissan Training Chinese Auto Techs to Work in Japan
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HINDENBURG RESEARCH ANNOUNCES IT’S DISBANDING
Automotive startups must be breathing a sigh of relief. Nate Anderson, who founded Hindenburg Research, announced he’s disbanding the investment firm, which shorts a company’s stock then publishes damaging reports about its finances. Hindenburg has had a major impact on the auto industry, especially startups. It took down Lordstown Motors after it revealed the company misled investors about its demand and production capabilities. Hindenburg also accused Nikola Motors of misleading investors about the capabilities of its fuel cell trucks, which led to founder and CEO, Trevor Milton going to prison. And earlier this month, the firm accused Carvana of shady accounting. All told, Hindenburg’s reports have led to nearly 100 individuals being civilly or criminally charged by regulators.
ACEA PRACTICALLY BEGGING EU TO RETHINK EMISSION RULES
The auto industry is facing big problems in Europe and European automakers are practically begging the European Union for help. The ACEA, which is the European automakers lobbying group, sent a letter to the EU saying it needs new regulations to cut CO2 emissions that are driven by the market, not by fines. It wants a strategy that will create economic growth, not curb it. It points out that EV sales are not progressing fast enough to meet the current regulations. And it says that paying heavy fines for missing CO2 targets will end up reducing the money that gets spent on R&D and other investments. The EU is notoriously bureaucratic and slow moving and so we have to wonder if it will move fast enough to save the European auto industry.
CHINESE AUTOMAKERS WANT TO BUY VW PLANTS
And right on the heels of that letter, Reuters reports that Chinese automakers are keenly interested in buying the assembly plants that Volkswagen wants to shut down in Germany. As we’ve reported, VW wants to idle several plants, slash production and reduce its workforce in Germany by 35,000 employees by 2030. Even though Chinese automakers could end up saving a bunch of those jobs, the idea of them taking over VW factories in Germany is highly sensitive. They want those plants because it would allow Chinese automakers to avoid the tariffs the EU has slapped on imported Chinese-made EVs. And China views buying German factories as a long-term strategic investment. But Reuters quotes a union official as saying they would only be open to building cars with VW’s joint venture partners in China, and that the cars would have to have the VW logo on them.
NADA PROMISES TO FIGHT DIRECT SALES
Scout wants to bypass franchised dealers and sell cars directly to consumers. So does Afeela, the joint venture between Honda and Sony. But the National Auto Dealers Association says it’s going to fight them every step of the way. Remember, each of the 50 U.S. states has its own franchise laws. And the NADA has said it will challenge Scout and Afeela in every state, which means the legal costs and the time it takes to litigate it all could take years. So that makes us wonder if either Scout or Afeela would try to take this all the way to the Supreme Court and get car dealer franchise laws overturned by claiming it’s a restraint of interstate trade. One thing’s for sure. We’re going to be talking about this story for some time to come.
KARGOBOT GET AUTONOMOUS PLATOONING APPROVAL
As we reported earlier this week, Chinese autonomous vehicle company Pony.ai, received permission from the Chinese government to operate platoons of autonomous trucks. And now another company just got the green light to do the same. KargoBot got permission to test platoons on certain sections of highways in Beijing. Autonomous platooning is where a lead semi-truck with a driver is followed by other semis without drivers.
CHINA’S JETOUR AIMS TO TAKE ON LAND ROVER & JEEP
Land Rover faces even more competition from its Chinese joint venture partner. In November of last year we reported that a brand of Chery is going to start selling SUVs in the UK that are similar to Land Rover vehicles, but undercut the price by as much as $18,000. And now another brand of Chery is going to launch a series of luxury off-road SUVs that will first go on sale in China, but they’re also being developed for global markets. The brand is called Jetour and it’s already registered trademarks for three names, but previously said it has plans to launch 8 or 9 models. Not only will these compete with Land Rover, Chery’s JV partner, but Jeep is a likely target and so is Tank, which is a brand under Great Wall Motors that sells vehicles in China, Europe, Africa and the Middle East. Jetour will hold a launch event for the new model sometime next week, so we should have more info soon.
STELLANTIS SHIPMENTS DECLINE
As we’ve reported, Stellantis is struggling and that continued in the fourth quarter of last year. The automaker’s global shipments declined 9% in the last three months of 2024 to about 1.4 million vehicles. In fact, shipments were down in all regions except South America. In Asia they were down 33%, in North America they were down 28% and in Europe shipments fell by 6%. And Maserati had a particularly bad 4th quarter with shipments slumping 55% to 2,700 vehicles.
RENAULT GROUP INCREASES ITS GLOBAL SALES
But it’s a different story for the Renault Group. It sold more than 2.2 million vehicles globally last year, including Dacia and Alpine, which is up 1.3% compared to 2023. The Renault brand’s sales were up 1.8%, Dacia was up 2.7% and Alpine increased sales by 5.9% last year. The Dacia Sandero was also the best-selling vehicle in Europe last year. And it was a good year for EVs. The Group’s electrified sales, including hybrids, increased 4.3% and now account for 35% of total sales.
HONDA’S AMERICAN SALES UP
American Honda wrapped up a pretty good year in 2024. Sales of 1.4 million vehicles were up 8.8%, easily outpacing the overall market. Hybrids did even better, shooting up 25%. And Lance Woelfer, the VP of sales, says 2025 should be even better. He thinks American Honda sales, which includes Acura, will go up another 5% to 1.5 million vehicles. And he’s especially excited that Honda will be building its own EVs in Ohio by the end of the year. As you know, the Honda Prologue, which is made by General Motors, outsold all of GM’s EVs last year. Woelfer says the Number One reason why customers said they bought the Prologue is that they trust the Honda brand.
HONDA WANTS NISSAN TO BUY RENAULT’S NISSAN SHARES
Speaking of Honda, but now its global operations, not the U.S. ones, it wants Nissan to buy out the shares that Renault has in Nissan. It’s all part of the merger that Honda and Nissan are putting together. Bloomberg reports that Renault has a 37.5% ownership in Nissan which is worth about $3.6 billion. Honda says it’s worried that Renault could sell those shares to someone else. And we would add that Honda probably doesn’t want Renault or the French government sticking their noses into its business. But right now Nissan doesn’t have the cash to buy out Renault. So Honda would probably have to pony up the money, or get the Japanese government to arrange some kind of financial deal.
NISSAN TRAINING CHINESE STUDENTS TO BECOME AUTO TECHS
There’s a worldwide shortage of people that work on cars, so Nissan is tapping into China’s massive population for help. It signed a memorandum of understanding with a public vocational school in China that will train students to work on Nissan cars, including EV repair. But this is not your typical training course. In phase 1 students will study in China for three or four years, learning basic maintenance skills, but they’ll also be taking Japanese language courses. In Phase 2 they get six months of language training in Japan, followed by three years of technician courses in Japan. And once they complete the program, they’ll be offered jobs at Nissan dealerships in Japan.
Hey, are robots really going to take over factory jobs? And then maybe move on to taking over the world? That’s what we’re going to be talking about on Autoline After Hours today. We’ve got Ed Marchese from ABB robotics, one of the global leaders in industrial robots, coming on the show today. We’re also going to have Lindsay Brooke, long-time automotive journalist along with us. And this is going to be a great discussion that you won’t want to miss. So join John and Gary when the show goes live at 3 pm eastern time.
But that’s a wrap for this show. Thanks for tuning in and I hope to see you later.
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No surprise on Maserati. Historically they were always unreliable, but their exterior design and interior accoutrement were top of the class. Now, they are unreliable and the exterior and interior design are all old and tired. So what are you buying a Maserati for?
There is a rare gem in the Maserati line up. The V6 Levante is actually reliable! A first for Maserati, well, if you don’t include that Chrysler Lebaron TC concoction which at least was reliable. Of course the exterior and interior are not remarkable, but at least it is reliable! That SUV is quite the bargain on the used market because everyone associates Maserati with lack of reliability so the resale value of the V6 Levante is in the basement.
I saw an interview with the younger Garcia of CARVANA, on an early business show about 10 days ago. . He was asked about the turnaround of the shock [ returning them to the wealthiest family in Arizona] He stated they had a Gross Margin of $7000 per unit !! !! I had seen that Michigan outlawed their sales due to Title Delays ! My Arizona Auto wholesaler had a couple words— Lies and Snake Oil—- . How clever with accounting do you need to be to find a $7000 per unit margin ??
Mark Tilton,
That is definitely some creative accounting to come up with $7K per unit. More normal would be around the $2K mark per unit. Tracking the auction house prices, Selling at $7K per unit would actually put their buy on the car less than what they would pay at a wholesale auction. And that is before any required repairs/rehab. $7K per unit is definitely some funny accounting.
The 3.0 V6 in the Maserati is a Ferrari engine, so that may be part of why its more reliable.
I’m skeptical of the Nissan training Chinese techs to work in Japan story. In my experience, NOBODY of non-Japanese heritage is allowed to work more than 5 years in Japan. Period. I met an American oil company executive that tried to extend his time in Japan only to have a government representative ‘escort’ him to the airport on the day his 5 years was up. Granted, that was many years ago, but I have heard nothing that suggests that the situation has loosened up. Actual emigration from China to Japan? No way.
@Merkur on Maserati reliability: what is the basis for those statements on reliability?
The Maserati Levante was in the second lowest bracket for reliability in CR’s survey. The V6 and V8 were combined, though. I’m a little surprised they had enough data to rate it. I think they now need at least 100 reported vehicles to publish data.
I’ve never dealt with Carvana, and it sounds like I don’t want to. I’ve had very good experience selling “specialty” cars to Carmax, though.