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AD #4072 – Should U.S. Automakers Get Out of China?; Cadillac Unveils Optiq-V; U.S. Auto Imports Plummet in May

June 9, 2025 by sean 17 Comments

Listen to “AD #4072 – Should U.S. Automakers Get Out of China?; Cadillac Unveils Optiq-V; U.S. Auto Imports Plummet in May” on Spreaker.

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Runtime: 11:06

0:00 U.S. Suppliers Get Rare Earth Reprieve from China
1:04 China to Continue Rare Earths To EU
1:37 U.S. Auto Imports Plummet in May
2:06 China EV Exports Up 19% This Year
2:27 Should U.S. Automakers Get Out of China?
4:11 Cadillac Unveils Optiq-V
6:05 Ram Gets Back in NASCAR
6:45 VinFast Bleeds More Red Ink
7:24 Marelli Could File for Chapter 11
8:12 Autoline Poll Results

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This is Autoline Daily, the show dedicated to enthusiasts of the global automotive industry.

U.S. SUPPLIERS GET RARE EARTH REPRIEVE FROM CHINA
That cutoff of rare earth minerals from China is triggering alarms across the auto industry, but there’s good news for General Motors, Ford and Stellantis. Reuters reports that China has granted temporary licenses for rare earth materials to suppliers of the Detroit 3. The licenses are valid for 6 months and we don’t know how much or what types of rare earths were approved. Even though it’s only a temporary reprieve, this is a big win for the automakers and suppliers, who were facing imminent production shutdowns. In fact, Ford had to stop building the Explorer for a week in May at its plant in Chicago because of the shortage. China controls around 90% of global rare earth production and it began restricting exports in retaliation to Trump’s tariffs in April.

CHINA TO CONTINUE RARE EARTHS TO EU
And the reprieve isn’t just with U.S. automakers and suppliers. Bloomberg reports that China agreed to speed up approvals for rare earth exports to Europe. But that’s also part of its negotiations with the European Union over its tariffs on Chinese EVs. China and the EU are close to an agreement on setting minimum prices for Chinese-made EVs. No doubt the clamp down on rare earth exports gave China a powerful bargaining chip.

U.S. AUTO IMPORTS PLUMMET IN MAY
Meanwhile, Trump’s tariffs have clobbered car imports to the U.S. According to trade database Descartes Datamyne, U.S. car imports plummeted 72% in May compared to a year ago and car parts were down 15%. That doesn’t include Canada and Mexico. Analysts say automakers are pausing exports until they really know what’s going to happen with those tariffs.

 

CHINA EV EXPORTS UP 19% THIS YEAR
China may be facing a backlash from all its automotive exports, but so far it hasn’t shown up in the numbers, at least not for EVs. For the first 5 months of the year, EV exports were up 19%. Chery, MG, Geely and BYD were the top 4 exporters.

SHOULD U.S. AUTOMAKERS GET OUT OF CHINA?
Say, should U.S. automakers just get out of China? That’s what auto analyst John Murphy from Bank of America is saying. He points out that demand in the Chinese market is falling, the industry is caught up in a wicked price war, and there’s going to be massive consolidation to address the massive amount of overcapacity that is weighing the industry down. But Murphy’s advice to get out of China applies to GM and Ford. He says Tesla needs to stay in China, even though there’s a lot of risk there for the company.

CADILLAC UNVEILS OPTIQ-V
Cadillac is really putting the pedal to the metal when it comes to EVs. It’s coming out with four all-electric models this year, including the Escalade IQ, the Vistiq, the Celistiq and the Optiq. And now it’s just added the V-version of the Optiq to the line-up. Here are the specs. It cranks out 519 horsepower and 650 pound-feet of torque, or 880 Newton meters. That power goes through all four wheels to propel the SUV to 60 miles an hour in 3.5 seconds. But there’s a trade-off for all the performance. Driving range is 275 miles from its 85-kWh battery pack, or 443 kilometers, though it does come standard with a NACS connector, opening it up to Tesla’s Supercharger network. It also features an adaptive suspension from ZF, Brembo front brakes, including 6-piston calipers, and Continental SportContact 6 tires. You can spot the V-version by the cladding along the rocker arms, the rear splitter and spoiler, and slightly different front grille. Inside, there’s an optional trim package featuring blue accents, including blue seat belts. The Optiq-V goes into production this fall with a starting price of $68,795 including destination charges. That’s about $14,000 more than the base Optiq and $12,000 less than the Lyriq-V. Cadillac will sell the Optiq-V in the U.S, Canada, Mexico, the Middle East, Israel and Japan.

Cadillac Optiq-V

RAM GETS BACK IN NASCAR
The Ram brand is getting its mojo back. First it brought back the iconic 5.7-liter HEMI V8 to its lineup, and now it’s getting back into NASCAR in the Craftsman Truck Series. It will join the series next year after a 13-year hiatus. That’s all we know right now, no word or which teams or drivers that will be involved. Tim Kuniskis, the head of the Ram, said NASCAR is the perfect fit for the brand. 20 million people are NASCAR fans, 50% of them drive a pickup truck, and 20% percent of them own Ram trucks.

Ram 1500 NASCAR Concept

VINFAST BLEEDS MORE RED INK
Vinfast, the Vietnamese automaker, reported its first quarter earnings, with some numbers looking better and others looking worse. It sold 36,330 cars, up 296%. That brought in $656 million in revenue, up 150%. But it posted a net loss of $712 million, which was nearly $100 million worse than a year ago. And it needed a $1.4 billion loan from its parent company to keep things going.

MARELLI COULD FILE FOR CHAPTER 11
Japanese auto supplier, Marelli, is considering filing for bankruptcy in the U.S. Yes, you heard that right, Japanese supplier Marelli. For all of us who remember when Magneti Marelli was part of Fiat and Italian through and through, those days are long gone. Marelli was bought by Japanese supplier Calsonic Kansei, which in turn is owned by U.S. private equity firm KKR. And KKR is thinking about taking Marelli into Chapter 11 to ensure that its operations won’t stop if its restructuring talks with creditors fall apart. Marelli is the 23rd largest auto supplier in the world and it’s a key supplier to Nissan and Stellantis.

AUTOLINE POLL RESULTS
We’ve got the latest results from our Autoline poll, which is open to our Patreon and YouTube members. The poll noted that “Automakers are looking at sharing powertrains with other automakers. What they want to know is if customers will care? What would you tell the car companies?”

58% of you said customers won’t care because most of them don’t even know which engine under the hood of their car. About a quarter of you said it will matter a lot to enthusiasts. And the rest of you had different opinions.

Thomas Bowen said, “Everyone and their mother makes a 2.0L turbocharged 4-cylinder engine, and the operating characteristics are nearly identical. Why duplicate the engineering and production expense when your customers will never know the difference?”

Randy Lamp noted this, “I remember the uproar in the early eighties when GM consolidated engines among Pontiac, Buick, Oldsmobile, Chevrolet and Cadillac. It was a big deal until it wasn’t.“

But rfmarks said engine sharing is not a good idea. “That’s what differentiates the brands.”

Scott Stephenson said, “I’d wager that 90% or more of Bronco Sport owners don’t have a clue there’s a 3-cylinder engine under the hood.”

And he’s right, there’s an optional 3-cylinder 1.5-liter turbo available in the Bronco Sport.

Thanks for all your comments, we know the automakers are keenly interested in this kind of feedback. And with that we wrap up today’s show, thanks for watching.
 

Thanks to our partner for embedding Autoline Daily on its website: WardsAuto.com

Filed Under: Autoline Daily, More to See Tagged With: auto supplier, bankruptacy, Cadillac Optiq-V, car exports, car imports, Chapter 11, China, Electric Vehicles and Environment, engine, EU, Europe, Ford, GM, Industry News, KKR, Marelli, NASCAR, New Cars and Trucks, President Trump, Ram, rare earth materials, Stellantis, tariffs, Tim Kuniskis, VinFast

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Regulus says

    June 9, 2025 at 12:35 pm

    will June sales in CA get a little bump because of all the vehicles torched the last few days by the savages in LA?

  2. Wim van Acker says

    June 9, 2025 at 12:54 pm

    @Regulus on CA car sales: yes, especially police cars. Sad to see the unrestricted destruction of property.

  3. MERKUR DRIVER says

    June 9, 2025 at 1:01 pm

    I wish Vinfast much luck. Their first release was a disaster of epic proportions. The most egregious of its problems was that it rode, handled, and stopped like an old worn out yugo. I think that they have largely course corrected with design changes after that disaster. Now their problem is that they have a car that costs as much, or more than a Cadillac EV. Between VInfast and a Cadillac EV, I would choose the Cadillac with its better interior/exterior every time. Or I would choose a Tesla over Vinfast as they are about the same cost as well. I don’t see a real reason why one would buy a Vinfast over the established competitors unless you just want something likely nobody else will have. So to them I say, best of luck.

  4. John McElroy says

    June 9, 2025 at 1:38 pm

    Merkur, Agreed. No much reason to buy a Vinfast over anything else.

  5. Kit Gerhart says

    June 9, 2025 at 2:36 pm

    From what I’ve read, the cars destroyed in the riots were 5 or 6 Waymo robotaxis, trivial numbers compared to the 6000+ vehicles destroyed in the LA area wild fires. Still, it’s senseless destruction that will hurt, not help the cause of the perpetrators.

    Of what I’ve seen and heard about Vinfast, I don’t know why anyone would buy one.

    I drove through the local Cadillac/Buick/GMC dealer yesterday, and they had two Hummer EV SUVs. I didn’t look at the stickers, but they are probably over $100K. They didn’t have any Cadillac cars, except for a used CT5. I don’t know if they sell so well they can’t keep them, or if they just don’t order them for stock. Maybe people who want them would customer order. There are enough choices of color, trims, powertrains, etc. that it would make sense to order them, as with Corvettes. I know I would order it if I wanted one. I hope they see fit to keep CT4 and CT5 around.

  6. Wim van Acker says

    June 9, 2025 at 2:43 pm

    @Kit: Waymo. Ah yes, I thought the ones burning were police cars because of the device on the roof, but those must have been the Waymo device. Sorry.

  7. GM Veteran says

    June 9, 2025 at 2:49 pm

    Let me get this straight. Ram has been out of NASCAR for 13 years. During that time, they have achieved their best annual sales totals ever. By their own admission, 25% of the pickup-owning fans own a Ram now. Their national share of the full size pickup market is 17%. So, they are doing very well with this market segment with no involvement in NASCAR. So, where is the logic in spending the huge amounts of money it takes to be a significant presence in that sport? It seems more logical to spend that money working to build their owner base in other sectors of the market.

  8. MJB says

    June 9, 2025 at 3:23 pm

    I saw one of those brand new ‘iQ’ Cadillacs just yesterday at Costco. (I think it was the Optiq). A guy pulled up in one next to me as I was leaving. I asked how he liked it and he said it’s nice except that he just can’t go very far.

  9. Kit Gerhart says

    June 9, 2025 at 3:42 pm

    Maybe Ram people think re-entering NASCAR will help win back people they lost by not offering a V8 for a while. It doesn’t make sense to me, though, unless they can get enough beer and erectile disfunction drug sponsors to cover a lot of the expenses.

  10. Ziggy says

    June 9, 2025 at 4:36 pm

    “And he’s right, there’s an optional 3-cylinder 1.5-liter turbo available in the Bronco Sport.”

    John, the engine you mentioned is the standard engine in the Bronco Sport, the 2.0-liter turbo is the optional one.

  11. Daily Driver says

    June 9, 2025 at 6:29 pm

    Driverless cars will be an easy and inviting target in any riot and unrest. I’m guessing all that radar tech that they pack into them is not cheap, beyond what the base vehicle costs. Good luck during that mostly peaceful riot, Waymo. I’m sure any opportunity to loot a driverless semi full of goods will also be seized upon in the future. They already loot Amazon train cars.

  12. Kit Gerhart says

    June 9, 2025 at 8:26 pm

    The 2.0 is available only in higher trim Bronco Sport, so I suspect most of them have the triple. The triple has “adequate” performance, with 8.9 second 0-60 in CR’s tests, but a new Prius will blow it away.

  13. Dan Kobussen says

    June 9, 2025 at 9:56 pm

    Per the engine poll, I’m surprised there was no comparison to transmissions. The Ram pickup, BMW and Audi’s have the same ZF transmissions. All these transmissions have different software settings, but all the same.

  14. Regulus says

    June 10, 2025 at 6:33 am

    @ Wim: Ik ben onlangs begonnen met een boek van uw landgenoot Geert Mak (geboren 1946), over Europa in de 20e eeuw, zoals gezien tijdens zijn reizen rond 2005. (Een goede vertaling in mijn eigen exotische moedertaal) Het is erg dik, 1200 pagina’s, en behandelt alle belangrijke gebeurtenissen uit de 20e eeuw. Het leest langzaam, want er staat veel in dat ik tot mijn verbazing niet kende; ik heb er nu nog geen 20% van gelezen.

  15. Regulus says

    June 10, 2025 at 8:38 am

    The premature heat over the last few days here broke by strong winds, but apparently when I was in the LR in the front of my summer home, around 10 PM, the winds broke a huge pine tree branch, (with more than a foot in diameter and over 20 feet length it was like a whole tree), and it fell on my yard. It is a pine tree and has dense needles and cones so until the neighbors on whose plot the broken tree is, come here and take it away, I will not know if it had caused any damage. It did not hit the house but it may have damaged the concrete (with iron bars on top) fence on which it also fell, plus some of my much smaller trees. It is ironic because the neighbors on the other side of the house, across the street, were always worried about one of my own pine trees that has grown bigger over the years, cracked the concrete fence and bent some of the iron bars on top of it. We thought of pruning that tree so if it ever falls, it does not fall across the street to the neighbor’s low house, but I am sure it would ruin the great shade it provides over the street (kind of an arch), great in the summer. I did call the ‘town hall’ a few years ago and spoke to their appropriate extension, but she never got back to me.

    Back to Autoline, John did his annual (but unnecessarily complicated and flawed) grading of automakers, a 20+ min Youtube video. Lots of important, useful and not useful data for his ‘top ten’. This year he also grades their alleged quality, but by using controversial JDPower rankings for just the first 3 years of the models. (I’d not take them seriously regardless of how many years they cover, as I never trust JDPower, who the makers pay to tell them these rankings. John also unnecessarily complicates things by using irrelevant criteria such as… ‘number of units made” per maker. Who cares? And it is not as if one unit is even close, let alone equal, to any other unit. And a lot more of irrelevant criteria. Profitability alone should be sufficient, averaged over time to smooth the trend.

  16. Regulus says

    June 10, 2025 at 9:10 am

    Waymos and other driverless cars, especially cargo vans with no passengers, can defend themselves against street thugs by various electrical, electronic and other systems providing some very nasty surprises to the thugs. And having no passengers they do not have to worry about the thugs hurting them and possible lawsuits.

  17. Regulus says

    June 10, 2025 at 12:39 pm

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_G._Trump

    You may have heard Trump mention his smarter uncle, MIT PhD AND Engineering Professor (and a very distinguished one at that) John G. Trump, but he never gave any details of his impressive accomplishments and world-wide recognition with major awards, incl the US National Medal of Science (which unfortunately was supposed to be given to him, but he died days earlier in 1985.

    The very lengthy article has all about him. He was his paternal uncle, his father’s brother and earlier his real estate partner, but they soon split as he changed from architecture to electrical engineering

    This was no fake doctor like Jill Biden (who is not a physician, but a universally reviled “Phd in Education”)

    What is the connection of the above with Cars? Professor Trump, in WW II, was asked to go through the archives of Nicola TESLA and concluded that there was nothing in there that could be exploited by the Nazis or the Japanese if they looked at them.

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