Trade News

DETROIT -- General Motors' U.S. light-vehicle sales fell 9.9 percent in the third quarter, as the automaker continues to face a shortage of high-demand pickups and SUVs. But GM's crossovers posted significant gains, with sales of the Buick Envision, Chevrolet Blazer and Cadillac XT6 each climbing more than 40 percent from a year ago.

GM delivered 665,192 vehicles in the quarter, the automaker said Thursday.

"Inventory levels remain very tight, especially for pickup trucks. This is a function of the pandemic-related downtime, as well as strong demand for our products," GM spokeswoman Lauren Langille told Automotive News. "We are currently running our full-size pickup truck and SUV plants at maximum capacity, and vehicles are being sold almost as soon as they arrive on dealer lots."

Sales improved each month in the quarter, GM said, adding that sales rebounded significantly in September.

Of GM's four U.S. brands, Buick fared best, down 2.9 percent f…

U.S. supplier Garrett Motion Inc., seeking to explore the Chinese market for fuel cell vehicles, will supply electric compressors to Shanghai-based Refire Technology Co., a leading FCV battery maker in China. 

The two companies this week in Beijing signed a strategic partnership agreement on the supply of the key component for batteries in fuel cell vehicles. 

With the deal, it plans to start large-scale electric compressor output for fuel cell vehicles in China in the near future, Garrett said.

Prior to the deal, Garrett supplied electric compressors for a fuel cell vehicle developed by state-owned Chinese automaker GAC Motor Co. The vehicle, the Trumpchi-badged Aion LX crossover, was displayed at the Beijing auto show this week.

Refire, a company established in Shanghai in 2015, said currently around 40 percent of all fuel cell vehicles in operation in China are powered by its battery systems. 

Garrett, which mainly makes a…

PSA Group will provide aid to bail out and revive a joint venture with Dongfeng Motor Group that has racked up prolonged financial woes. 

The French automaker, which is in the midst of merging with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, said this week it will provide 50 million euros ($58.5 million) in the fourth quarter, which will be used as working capital by the partnership. 

In the first quarter of 2021, it will join Dongfeng and make an additional investment to recapitalize the joint venture, PSA added, without revealing the planned investment. 

From 2020 to 2037, PSA said it will also provide up to 100 million yuan ($14.7 million) each year to help the partnership with marketing, brand-building and a dealership network expansion. 

PSA and Dongfeng established the joint venture, Dongfeng Peugeot Citroen, in the central China city of Wuhan in 1992 to produce and market passenger vehicles under the Peugeot and Citroen brands.  Read more

French supplier Faurecia plans to build a factory in Shanghai to build seats for Tesla Inc.’s vehicle assembly plant.

The 25 million-yuan ($3.7 million) factory will be built in Shanghai’s Linguang neighborhood where the Tesla plant is located, the French supplier said this week, without divulging additional details on the factory. 

Seating supply is the second business Faurecia has secured from Tesla in China. In 2019, it started supplying complete cockpit modules to Tesla’s Shanghai plant. 

Faurecia began parts production in China in 1992. It runs 58 plants in the country that produce seats, interior trim and emissions control components. 

Tesla launched output of its first product built in China, the Model 3 sedan, at the Shanghai plant in January. 

The U.S. electric-vehicle maker is expanding the factory to assemble the Model Y crossover.

Faurecia ranks No. 8 on the Automotive News list of the top 100 global s…

Republicans remain on the road, while Democrats pump brakes

Need further evidence the nation's political divide has pervaded almost every facet of American life? Differences extend right down to our collective driving habits.

Democrats have hit the brakes on driving more so than Republicans since the outbreak of the pandemic, according to an analysis published Tuesday by Sivak Applied Research.

According to the latest data, drivers in states that are either solidly or likely Democratic have trimmed their driving by 14.1 percent. That's nearly twice the 7.6 percent drop among drivers in solidly or likely Republican states.

Researcher Michael Sivak gathered the latest available vehicle-miles-traveled figures from the Federal Highway Administration and compared them with data on political preferences from the Cook Political Report.

In states that leaned in only one direction or the other or were considered toss-ups, drivers had decreased the…

LOS ANGELES — Acura will show a prototype of the fourth-generation MDX crossover on Oct. 14, marking the third vehicle in its lineup to undergo a full redesign as the brand seeks to move upmarket by leveraging its performance heritage.

Acura released a teaser image and short video showing the redesigned midsize crossover with an accentuated beltline and fastback styling. The next-gen MDX "will usher in new levels of Acura design, performance, technology and craftsmanship, assuming the mantle as the brand's new flagship model," Acura said.

The redesigned MDX is expected to go on sale sometime next year. Sales of the three-row crossover have tallied more than 1 million over the last two decades, Acura said, making it the brand's bestselling model.

Acura's redesigned TLX midsize sedan went on sale this month as a 2021 model. The RDX compact crossover was the first of Acura's core models to adopt the brand's new styling language and mechanicals when it was…

Lithia Motors Inc. said it anticipates third-quarter net income to surge and announced plans to raise more than $1 billion through debt and equity offerings.

The Medford, Ore., retailer said Tuesday that net income per diluted share will be between $6.10 to $6.40, an increase of 68 percent and 76 percent, respectively, compared with $3.64 per share recorded last year. Assuming Lithia retains about 23 million outstanding shares it reported in the second quarter, that would translate to a net income of $140 million to $147 million. That compares with a net income of $78 million in the second quarter in 2019 and $85 million in the third quarter.

Lithia also said it expects to report revenue rising "in the mid- to high single-digit range" compared with 2019's reported $3.3 billion for the third quarter.

Separately, Lithia announced plans to raise $1.2 billion in capital through debt and equity offerings. The company expects $500 million to come from a senio…

DETROIT — The past two leaders of the UAW are now admitted felons.

Dennis Williams, who served as the union's president from 2014 to 2018, pleaded guilty Wednesday to embezzling money from the members he once led. Appearing in U.S. District Court by videoconference wearing a dark suit and dark tie, Williams admitted wrongdoing and apologized for his actions.

"As an officer of the UAW, I held a position of trust," Williams said. "I know my actions and failures to act abused that trust. It hurt the union I loved. I'm here now to take full responsibility."

His admission comes almost four months after his successor, Gary Jones, pleaded guilty to similar charges as part of a yearslong federal corruption probe.

Prosecutors last month charged Williams, 67, with conspiring to embezzle funds from rank-and-file workers for nearly a decade.

Court documents say Williams and others spent hundreds of thousands of member dollars on trips to Palm Springs…

Velodyne Lidar Inc. could ride higher as the self-driving car revolution takes hold -- that is if such modes of transport come to realization sooner rather than later.

The maker of sensors used in advanced driver-assistance systems and self-driving vehicles is projected to see robust revenue growth and hit full-year profitability as soon as 2022, according to CEO Anand Gopalan.

“We have seen a tremendous momentum, even in our own pipeline, of customers moving to mass-market commercialization of their applications,” Gopalan said in an interview, referencing the greater use of ADAS systems in consumer cars and the growth of autonomous vehicle companies whose systems rely on lidar. Yet, the timeline for broad deployment of autonomous vehicles appears to be in question.

Velodyne Lidar shares sank on Wednesday after emerging from a special-purpose acquisition company in the wake of controversy around Nikola Corp., which made its public market debut in similar…

The number of auto loans more than 30 days past due inched up in August, an early sign that customers coming out of forbearance programs aren't keeping up with their car payments, credit bureau TransUnion said last week.

The first waves of consumers to exit forbearance programs have mostly displayed positive payment performance, said Matt Komos, vice president of research and consulting at TransUnion. Though the longer an account is in hardship status — defined by factors such as a deferred payment, forbearance program, frozen account or frozen past-due payment — the less likely it is for that consumer to smoothly take up their debt obligations.

"It's still much too early to tell," Komos said about rising 30-day auto loan and mortgage delinquencies. "It could simply be 'sloppy' payment behavior where consumers miss an occasional payment or are late by a few days or weeks, though their intention is still to make the payment."

The rat…

A Missouri Supreme Court verdict in a case that started with a dispute over a vehicle repossession could have far-reaching implications beyond the auto lending industry. Legal experts say the ruling could open the door for consumers from multiple states to form class-action lawsuits against any business, even if the laws from the various states differ from those in the state where the plaintiff resides. The Missouri high court affirmed a lower court's certification of a class in the dispute.

Ally Financial Inc., one of the largest U.S. auto lenders, filed a petition Aug. 14 to the U.S. Supreme Court to review Ally Financial vs. Alberta Haskins, et al., a conflict that began when Missouri residents Alberta Haskins and David Duncan defaulted on an auto loan with Ally for a used 2006 Chevrolet Colorado.

Ally repossessed the truck and sold it at auction in 2012. The lender sued for the couple's $4,000 deficiency on their finance contract in March 2…