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Runtime: 10:28
0:00 Hyundai Surpasses GM Market Cap
1:14 VW Overtakes Tesla in Europe
2:10 Chinese EVs Surging in Mexico
3:17 Data Center Chip Shortages Affecting OEMs
4:35 New Mercedes S-Class & Level 4 Tech
5:16 VW Project Trinity & Recycling Hub
6:17 Renault Bringing Ampere In-House
6:47 Mazda & Volvo Hybrid Pivot on EVs
7:41 Nissan Dealer Profit Crisis
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This is Autoline Daily, the show dedicated to enthusiasts of the global automotive industry.
HYUNDAI SURPASSES GM MARKET CAP
Well, here’s a historical inflection point for the automotive industry. The Hyundai Group now has a higher market cap than General Motors. Hyundai’s share prices exploded after it showed off its latest humanoid robots at CES two weeks ago. Get this. Hyundai’s stock is up almost 84% since January 1. It now has a market capitalization of $76 billion, compared to $72 billion for General Motors. We think this shows the hunger there is to invest in humanoid robots. Four years ago, Hyundai paid about $880 million to buy Boston Dynamics, which is one of the leading robotics companies in the world. That $880 million has now added $45 billion in market value to Hyundai. And yet, GM is no slouch. Its stock was up 61% last year, and its market cap is up 53% over the last 6 months. So for Hyundai to surpass that in just the last three weeks shows the market mania there is to invest in humanoids.
VW OVERTAKES TESLA IN EUROPE
Here’s another inflection point. The Volkswagen brand on its own overtook Tesla last year as the top BEV-maker in Europe. According to Dataforce, VW sold more than 274,000 fully-electric vehicles in 2025, a gain of 56%. Meanwhile, Tesla’s sales were down 27% to just under 239,000 units. That’s a pretty big reversal. In 2024, Tesla sold more than 326,000 EVs in Europe compared to 175,000 for VW. The Volkswagen Group also did well in BEV sales with Skoda and Audi coming in at number 4 and 5 overall last year. While BMW was third. Overall, automakers sold nearly 2.6 million BEVs in Europe last year, up 30% from 2024.
CHINESE EVs SURGING IN MEXICO
Sales of Chinese EVs and plug-ins are really taking off in Mexico. In 2021, fewer than 500 were imported into the country. But last year, that surged to nearly 100,000 units. And the overwhelming majority of those imports, 84%, are from BYD. To help protect its auto industry, the Mexican-government imposed tariffs as high as 50% on Chinese auto imports, which went into effect at the beginning of this year. But the tariffs aren’t expected to have much impact because the Chinese brands are expected to absorb some of the increases. Also, most legacy brands don’t compete in the affordable EV segment in Mexico, which pretty much leaves it to the Chinese. And Chinese EVs are expected to benefit from Mexico’s EV policies and subsidies. But it’s not just electrified vehicles, Chinese automakers are also doing well selling gas-powered vehicles in Mexico and Chinese brands now account for 20% of the overall new car market.
DATA CENTER CHIP SHORTAGES AFFECTING OEMs
You know all those data centers that are getting built all over the place? They’ve got a lot of people worried about all the electricity and water they’re using. Well, they’re also using so many memory chips, the same ones used by automakers and suppliers, that prices are up 100% and it’s leading to a shortage. Analysts warn that OEMs better lock in supplies right now. They name Visteon and Aumovio as two suppliers most at risk, while Tesla and Rivian face higher risk than GM or Ford.
NEW MERCEDES S-CLASS & LEVEL 4 TECH
The new S-Class debuts at the end of this month, which Mercedes calls the biggest refresh in the history of the luxury sedan. It has over 2,700 changed or refined parts, representing more than 50% of the vehicle. Importantly, it’s the first S-Class to feature Mercedes’ new operating system, which means it can support the company’s newest tech. CEO Ola Källenius even claims the luxury sedan is ready for Level 4 driving, which requires no human intervention with its operating zone, and says it’s running the 1st pilots on streets right now. So, it sounds like it could be offered as an OTA update in the future.
VW PROJECT TRINITY & RECYCLING HUB
Speaking of Level 4, Volkswagen was supposed to get there with its Project Trinity, the company’s own efforts at developing a software defined vehicle architecture. The first models to come from that were supposed to start production at VW’s Zwickau plant in Germany this year. But due to the struggles of the company’s CARIAD unit that won’t happen. Zwickau currently produces EVs for the Group, but it sounds like there’s some extra space because VW is investing 90 million euros over the next two years to turn the site into its main recycling hub. Workers will dismantle cars for valuable raw materials as well as for parts that can be refurbished or resold as used. VW will use 500 vehicles for testing this year, but the plant will be able to tear apart 15,000 vehicles a year by 2030. VW says this opens up additional market and revenue potential and this will become a template for other sites within the Volkswagen production network.
RENAULT BRINGING AMPERE IN-HOUSE
In late 2023, Renault spun off its EV operations under a new company called Ampere. This was still back during the EV investment craze, and Renault expected Ampere to quickly hit a €10 billion market cap. But when EV sales in Europe came in far lower than expected, the company never got listed. And so this morning Renault announced it is bringing Ampere back in-house, where it will serve as an engineering center for EVs and software.
MAZDA & VOLVO HYBRID PIVOT ON EVs
Like most automakers, Mazda is rolling back EV plans and will focus on hybrids. The automaker is delaying the launch of its first dedicated EV by at least two years to 2029. The model was supposed to debut next year and be built in Japan but it’s being delayed because of changing incentive policies in the U.S. and Europe and the new U.S. tariffs.
Volvo is also pivoting to more hybrids. The automaker planned to transition to an EV only lineup but dropped those plans because of weaker than expected EV sales. In the U.S., the company’s sales fell 3% last year. And while dealers expect 2026 to be rough too, mainly due to an aging lineup, new models are expected to start rolling in by the end of year. So they’re optimistic things will really turn around next year.
NISSAN DEALER PROFIT CRISIS
Nissan’s U.S. dealers are in deep trouble. Automotive News reports that last year, the average Nissan store made less than $8,500 in net profits. In a desperate bid to gain market share and trigger factory subsidies, dealers offered deep discounts on cars that hurt their profits. Mike Rezi, the chairman of Nissan’s National Dealer Advisory board, says each dealer needs to sell 70 cars a month to make a decent profit, but are only selling 40 a month. Nissan is changing how it provides incentives to dealers and is rushing to put a number of hybrids in their showrooms, but they’re still about a year away.
And that brings us to the end of today’s show. Thanks for tuning in.
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Thanks for the great autoline stories today, sorry to hear that Mexico is being hit by the Chinese invasion in the auto industry so that more than Canada is being affected but then our government has made a deal since there is more to trade than the auto industry like Canola oil.
My son who dabbles in building his own computer hardware is regularly complaining of chip shortages saying that higher tech chips are impossible to get and older chips are in short supply at higher prices. Perhaps companies like Substrate a US startup using particle accelerators to carve the integrated circuits will bring availability of very high tech chips for the auto industry maybe this is where Elon Musk is getting some ideas from?
The chinese are following the tried and true displacement path that every other OEM has done. All at the expense of the big players who are asleep at the wheel. That is cheap auto. The big OEMs have always said the same thing every single time this has happened. People don’t want cheap auto. People don’t want poor build quality. People don’t want whatever they feel is a negative to vehicles in the cheap auto segment. And yet every single cheap auto OEM since the 70s has done the exact same thing. Flood the markets with cheap auto and go from there. At some point the GM/Ford’s of the world will realize that there is a market for a competent cheap auto. If the market is large enough to introduce brand new players out of nowhere and allow them to capitalize on that and destroy GM/Ford in the process. Then the market is big enough for Ford/GM to jump in. Once Ford/GM dilute the cheap auto market, the new players will fall apart.
Canada accepts unlimited car imports from the US, Europe, Japan, South Korea and just about anyone else. So why are people suddenly whining when China is allowed to bring a limited amount of vehicles in?? (49,000) If those cars are acceptable, they will sell and the Chinese companies will build assembly plants in Canada for Canada. That is what the Japanese (Toyota and Honda) did and what Hyundai/KIA is eventually be going to be forced to do. I have no doubt that the Chinese will also do it, which is a heck of a lot more that Europe ever did. The US, of course, is rapidly CLOSING their local assembly plants. If they continue this, I look forward to the day when the US (and the Europeans) get locked out of the Canadian market entirely. China produces better cars at lower sales prices, so I say ‘Bring them on’. Also, China is NOT the one threatening to invade Canada. The US is! Think about that before you decide who is the bad guy!
MERKUR- you hit the nail on the head. It’s like the domestic automakers think entry level vehicles are beneath them. That’s a market for start ups. Yet that’s how the Japanese got in how the Koreans got in and soon the Chinese will get in. Undercut everyone and they will sell. I mean even the Yugoslavians produced a cheap car with some success despite it was a horrible vehicle. But the price was the draw. I’m sure the economy market doesn’t have great returns. They’re not making 10k on each vehicle like they can with the large trucks,SUVs and luxury vehicles. But when you neglect a market you open the door for more competition and soon they’re not making just entry level cars anymore. They’ll be eating GM and Fords lunch.
If BMW, Mercedes, and VW had anticipated a Donald Trump, they might have put their plants in Canada rather than the U.S. Either that, or they might have expanded their existing operations in Mexico. Many major car companies have manufacturing in Mexico, which has relatively free trade with most countries, and used to with the U.S.
Maybe micro chips won’t be double the price if the US gets some sort of partnership with Greenland. An area untapped and rich with oil, and mineral resources including lithium copper and zinc. Just maybe the administration is preparing us for the future not so dependent on China. Not to mention the strategic military position, control of Arctic shipping routes for global trade and limiting Chinas influence in Greenland. Rather than wait and see what China does and react. The administration is positioning us to block China now rather than wait for it to be a problem. China has been playing chess with the US & UK for years and winning. Buying key assets and maintaining control of valuable resources like even some of our US ports. While the media plays it off like Trump is out trying to capture a large ice cube for the sake of it there are definitely some huge implications that could come from Greenland. Chip application is obviously a massively growing market.
Obviously Greenland isn’t for sale it’s a self governing territory of Denmark. Both of which have no interest in what Trump was throwing down. I admit his approach was idiotic and almost guaranteed that negotiations would go no further. The advantages are still very real tho and maybe someone with a better approach will be able to negotiate some partnership. Key minerals for chip production and batteries are something everyone is going to be seeking in the future.
GM, Ford, and Stella North American are counting on big trucks and SUVs selling well forever. Ford not only dropped all of their cars except Mustang, but they even dropped Escape, one of their better selling vehicles. Explorer sells pretty well, probably a quarter of them to police departments.