Trade News

Carvana shares surged 34 percent in early trading after the struggling online used retailer released its first-quarter earnings results. Lucid executives face tough questions after sluggish sales. Plus, a conversation about tracking the paperless progress of dealerships and lenders.

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After booting out a CEO convicted of fraud, launching an electric heavy-duty truck and getting ready to start the first delivery of its flagship hydrogen fuel cell big rig, Nikola Corp. is looking to the next phase of its turnaround.

The company's success is pinned on the fuel cell truck and its efforts to create depots where customers can get clean hydrogen to run the zero-emission vehicles.

"I think that's very important because if you just have a world-class truck, a best-in-class truck, as we have, customers quite rightly will say, 'Well, we're out of hydrogen,' " Michael Lohscheller, Nikola's CEO, told Automotive News. "What we want to do from the Nikola side is really offer the truck and the energy."

The success of these ventures will be key for Nikola to become a serious competitor in the truck space, contribute to solving one of transportation's most confounding issues and build up its reputation as a transformative company with technology that…

First-quarter net income at Magna International Inc., North America's largest auto supplier, fell 43 percent from a year earlier to $209 million as inflationary pressures took a bite out of the company's bottom line.

The supplier said higher labor, energy and engineering costs cut into its profit margin, as did lower scrap steel and aluminum sales and inefficiencies at a facility in Europe.

But sales in the period rose 11 percent from a year earlier to $10.67 billion, benefiting from improved light-vehicle production in North America and Europe and the launch of new programs. And Magna increased its financial outlook for the year on better global vehicle production estimates and as the company works to reduce expenses and improve its cost structure, CEO Swamy Kotagiri said.

"We have remained focused on driving operational improvements, working with our customers to recover inflationary costs and executing on our strategy to deliver long-term value," Kot…

The continued turbulence of the automotive industry and the rapid transition to electrification has driven seating supplier Adient plc to take a new approach to doing business.

It's no longer about growing market share at all costs, or winning every contract no matter the value proposition, according to CEO Doug Del Grosso.

The Plymouth-based company, projected to hit $15 million in revenue this year, has become more deliberate about walking away from business it doesn't like and more aggressive about renegotiating contracts that no longer make financial sense.

"We've changed our mindset over the course of the last four years," Del Grosso told Crain's Detroit Business, an affiliate of Automotive News, during a wide-ranging interview at the company's Plymouth Technical Center. "It's very much bottom-line performance-based and not top-line growth. Unless we're absolutely sure we can get a return on our investment, we don't really measure performance in …

BEIJING — China will speed up the construction of charging facilities for new energy vehicles such as electric cars, and improve policies for purchasing and using them, state media quoted the nation's cabinet as saying on Friday.

Improved charging infrastructure for new energy vehicles will help unleash the potential of rural consumption and support growth of rural tourism, adding new impetus to rural revitalization, the cabinet was quoted as saying after a regular meeting.

The government is studying policies to promote auto consumption and support modernization as China's NEV market faces challenges from weak domestic demand, Xin Guobin, vice minister at Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said last month.

The cabinet, or State Council, has approved plans to speed up the development of advanced manufacturing clusters, state media also reported.

Developing such clusters will be vital for steering China's industries towards innovation,…

A possible electrical problem in a 2009 Dodge Journey may have caused the death of a woman trapped in her burning car. According to NHTSA's Office of Defects Investigation report, there are about 82,500 similar vehicles.

NHTSA on May 1 said it opened a preliminary evaluation in response to the December 2022 incident. The ODI learned of the incident in January 2023.

According to the NHTSA report, the driver pulled over and called for help when all warning lights began flashing, wipers came on, horn started honking, windows would not go down and doors would not unlock. The vehicle caught fire, with the fire appearing to begin in the engine compartment and eventually consuming the vehicle.

"We extend our deepest sympathies to the friends and families of this customer and will cooperate fully with the NHTSA," a North American spokesman for Stellantis told Automotive News.

The vehicle was equipped with both automatic and manual locks, according to th…

Lordstown Motors on Thursday reported a steep fall in its cash reserves and warned it might have to stop making its Endurance electric pickup truck in the near future unless it finds a partner.

The cash-strapped EV maker had earlier this week said it might be forced to file for bankruptcy, citing uncertainty over a $170 million investment deal with its major shareholder Foxconn.

Lordstown, named after the town in Ohio where it is based, said on Thursday it was in talks with the Apple supplier but was yet to reach a deal.

In May 2022, Lordstown Motors completed a deal to sell its Ohio factory for $230 million to Foxconn, excluding assets such as the hub motor assembly and battery pack lines.

Foxconn will make Fisker Inc's electric compact car at the Ohio factory starting next year, the EV startup has said.

Lordstown Motors had cash and cash equivalents of $108.1 million as of March 31, down from $203.6 million a year earlier.

Shares…

Carvana Co. said Thursday it sold fewer used vehicles in the first quarter as a result of a continued pullback on growth initiatives and reduced inventory size, but reported boosted total per-vehicle profit and a slimmer net loss.

The online used-vehicle retailer reported a net loss of $286 million for the quarter ended March 31, smaller than the $506 million it lost in the first quarter of 2022. Revenue fell 25 percent to $2.6 billion. It also reported an adjusted loss of earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization of $24 million, significantly smaller than its adjusted EBITDA loss of $348 million a year ago.

"Given our strong start to the year, we expect to achieve positive adjusted EBITDA in Q2 2023," CEO Ernie Garcia said in a statement.

Carvana sold 79,240 used vehicles, down 25 percent from 105,185 sold in the year-earlier period. That sales volume figure was just over a preliminary estimate the company gave in a March 22 regula…

Wheel supplier Superior Industries International on Thursday reported a first-quarter net loss of $4 million.

That's compared with net income of $10 million during the same quarter in 2022. The loss was caused by industry production levels that are still below pre-pandemic levels, as well as struggling European aftermarkets, executives said during a call Thursday with analysts.

The company's revenue fell 4.8 percent to $381 million. With the cost of aluminum significantly lower than a year ago, value-added sales increased by 7 percent despite lower unit shipments and revenue, according to CFO Tim Trenary. Still, customers opted for more expensive, larger wheels and the company's content-per-wheel costs increased by 16 percent.

"We enjoyed considerable success in recovering cost inflation in 2022 and pivoted late last year to negotiating appropriate price increases to offset the cost of inflation, the cost of OEM production schedule volatility and lower f…

The UAW said workers at a Yanfeng auto parts plant in Riverside, Mo., a key General Motors supplier, voted to join the union.

Of the roughly 430 workers who were eligible to vote in the election, 311 voted yes and 26 voted no, the UAW said in a statement Thursday.

Yanfeng, based in China, is a supplier of smart products, interiors, seating, electronics and other products with more than 240 operations worldwide. The company's North American business is headquartered in suburban Detroit.

The Riverside facility produces components for General Motors' Fairfax Assembly Plant in Kansas City. It is the sixth Yanfeng operation to organize with the UAW and the Riverside workers join more than 1,000 other Yanfeng-employed UAW members at facilities in Michigan, Canada and Alabama.

The UAW said workers at the plant have faced low pay, a lack of seniority rights and understaffed shifts. Additionally, the UAW said workers of color have faced discrimination from…

LOS ANGELES — Porsche has put the combustion engine Cayenne on the path to retirement, but first, the automaker is giving the workhorse midsize crossover a midcycle freshening that feels more like a redesign.

To elevate the driving experience, Porsche has dialed up engine output across the Cayenne lineup.

While the industry steers away from thirsty V-8 engines to meet ever-tightening emissions regulations, Porsche is returning the big engine to the Cayenne S for the U.S. after ditching it nearly a decade ago.

The 2024 Cayenne S swaps its V-6 for a V-8 that makes an additional 34 hp and delivers a 0-to-60-mph time of 4.4 seconds. Porsche mechanically adapted the eight-cylinder to make it "at least as fuel-efficient" as the V-6, said Mike DePetro, product manager for Porsche Cars North America.

The V-8 also helps differentiate the S trim from the base Cayenne.

"The V-8 is a very important American need and want in an automobile," he told Aut…

BorgWarner Inc. executives are expecting a boom in the electrification business but not before e-products put some strain on its profitability.

The supplier saw first-quarter sales of $4.2 billion, up 8 percent from a year ago, and net earnings of $230 million, about flat with last year, according to its earnings report Thursday.

While the company increased its sales and earnings projections for the full year, its first-quarter profit results came in just shy of Wall Street expectations, due to inflated costs, high R&D spending on electrification and sagging sales in China, which is also hurting other suppliers with high exposure to the Far East.

"We outperformed the market both in Europe and North America," CEO Frederic Lissalde said on a call with investment analysts. "As we expected going into the quarter, our margin performance was negatively impacted by our planned e-R&D investment, net inflationary costs and the impact of low production i…