Trade News

New-vehicle sales surged 32 percent in January from a year earlier, when the coronavirus outbreak emerged and the lunar Chinese New Year holiday resulted in fewer working days, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers estimates.

Some 2.5 million new vehicles were delivered across China last month, according to a preliminary tally by the trade group.

Demand for new light vehicles -- sedans, crossovers, SUVs, multipurpose vehicles and minibuses -- jumped 28 percent to nearly 2.1 million.

Deliveries of new commercial vehicles, such as trucks and buses, soared 50 percent to approach 480,000. 

In late January 2020, the virus began spreading from the central city of Wuhan to the rest of the country, eventually shutting down assembly plants and dealership showrooms as the government restricted travel. 

Last year, the weeklong Chinese New Year holiday began Jan. 24. This year, the holiday starts Feb. 11. 

Tesla Inc. launched production of battery chargers at a newly built plant in Shanghai this week. 

The 42 million-yuan ($6.5 million) factory was built in less than six months in Shanghai near Tesla’s vehicle assembly plant. It will mainly build Tesla’s third-generation charging poles for EVs built in China, the company’s EV charging unit in China said on its social media site.

Tesla has accelerated the rollout of charging stations in China after it opened the assembly plant in Shanghai at the end of 2019. Tesla builds the Model 3 sedan and Model Y crossover in Shanghai.

The U.S. EV maker has installed 730 charging stations in more than 300 Chinese cities, with more than 410 built in 2020, its EV charging unit in China said.

Audi delivered 86,888 vehicles in China in January, an increase of 36 percent and a record for the month, on higher import volume. 

Sales of imported Audi models soared 411 percent from a year earlier to 9,200, the Audi unit of VW Group’s joint venture with China FAW Group Corp. said this week.

The import tally includes 2,089 A8s, 1,768 Q7s and 1,753 A5 Sportbacks.

In January, combined deliveries of Audi’s locally produced models jumped 25 percent to 77,688, and included sales of 19,729 A4s, 18,994 A6s and 17,481 Q5s. 

In 2020, Audi’s China sales rose 5.4 percent to a record high of 727,358.

Two other major German luxury brands, Mercedes-Benz and BMW, haven’t disclosed January sales results.

Nio, XPeng and Li Auto, three U.S.-listed Chinese electric-vehicle startups, saw January deliveries in China spike well above volumes posted a year earlier.

Sales at Nio shot up 352 percent to 7,225, the company said this week, with 1,660 ES8 SUVs, 2,720 ES6 crossovers and 2,845 EC6 coupe-like crossovers delivered. 

XPeng said January volume soared 470 percent to 6,015. The tally consists of 3,710 P7 full-size sedans and 2,305 G3 compact crossovers. 

Sales at Li Auto, which only markets one model – the Li One SUV -- surged 356 percent to 5,379 last month. 

Nio unveiled a third product, the ET7 full-size sedan, last month. It will go on sale in the first quarter of 2022 with a range of more than 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) on one charge, the company said. 

XPeng and Li Auto haven’t disclosed details about future products. 

Nio and XPeng, both established in 2014, are listed on New York Stock Exchange. Li Auto…

Watch the global reveal of theall-new 2022 Nissan Frontierand the all-new 2022 Nissan Pathfinder

Watch the global reveal of the all-new 2022 Nissan Frontier and the all-new 2022 Nissan Pathfinder

[embedded content]

NEW YORK -- The head of a New York money manager that holds a controlling stake in the nation's 11th-largest auto dealership group was criminally charged along with two associates on Thursday with running what authorities called a $1.8 billion Ponzi-like fraud where thousands of victims were falsely promised steady returns on their investments.

David Gentile, CEO of GPB Capital Holdings LLC, was accused of using new money to repay earlier investors, and together with his co-defendants siphoning millions of dollars to pay themselves and fund luxury expenses, including a Ferrari for Gentile. The federal indictment was unsealed in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn, N.Y.

Authorities said more than 17,000 retail investors were taken in by promises that GPB would provide consistent 8 percent annual returns plus occasional “special” distributions.

Criminal charges were also brought against Jeffry Schneider, the owner of GPB’s placement agent Ascendant Capital, an…

Volkswagen Group has opened a pilot battery recycling plant in the German town of Salzgitter that it believes can recover and reuse up to 90 percent of the valuable raw materials that make up the batteries for its growing wave of EVs.

The plant's recycling efforts are aimed at the end of the use line for lithium ion automotive battery packs, long after their first lives powering vehicles or their second lives as mobile energy storage devices. The plant focuses on the recovery of elements including lithium, nickel, manganese and cobalt from the battery packs, along with aluminum, copper and plastics used in their construction.

Automotive News detailed the automaker's ambitious battery recycling plans in 2019. The plant is part of the multibrand automaker's $86 billion go-for-broke blitz into electric vehicles, including the Porsche Taycan, …

Groups representing automakers, suppliers, tech companies and other stakeholders are calling on Congress to support bipartisan legislation that will foster the development and safe deployment of automated vehicles in the U.S.

In a letter sent Wednesday to congressional leaders, the Coalition for Future Mobility stressed the critical need for a federal framework for AVs that provides "clarity that affirms existing roles and maintains the balance of responsibilities between federal-state-local levels of government, modernizes federal regulatory processes and ensures rigorous safety standards for the continued development and safe deployment of AV technologies."

"Put simply, the investments and policies being made today by our organizations toward a safer, more environmentally friendly, accessible and equitable U.S. transportation future depends on a thoughtful federal legislative approach and regulatory framework for AVs," the groups said in the l…

Honda has put a significant portion of its U.S. media account under review. Up for grabs is the automaker’s so-called Tier 2 media business, which includes regional advertising that is often used to plug sales incentives and is closely linked with individual dealer efforts.

RPA currently handles Honda’s national creative and media business, including some Tier 2 media work. Other agencies involved in Tier 2 media include Horizon Media. Honda Motor Co. spent $1.39 billion on U.S. advertising in 2019, including the Honda and Acura brands, according to the latest figures from the Ad Age Datacenter. (The figure does not include the entirety of dealer association spending that is a part of the review.) A person familiar with the review suggests the Tier 2 account could represent as much as $550 million in spending. 

“We have begun a process to assess which agencies have the capabilities to support our DAAs,” American Honda said in a statement to Ad Age, r…

Safe-Guard, the white-label finance-and-insurance giant behind many automaker programs, deployed an end-to-end solution for its partners to more effectively capture missed F&I opportunities.

The tool allows customers to purchase F&I products on a site branded by the retailer or automaker partner. It is the latest example of F&I companies crafting consumer-facing content or purchasing portals to maximize sales in digital environments.

The aftermarket sale of F&I products has existed for years, with dealerships or direct-to-consumer vendors marketing to customers through robocalls, text messages and letters in the mail, said James Tom, vice president of direct to consumer at Safe-Guard. The company's solution — which consists of direct marketing offers, back-end support through a call center and an e-commerce website — aims to drive aftermarket F&I product sales using information sourced directly from the retailer or automake…