Trade News

Mark Frissora, the former chairman and CEO of Hertz Global Holdings Inc., will return nearly $2 million in incentive-based compensation to settle a U.S. regulator’s claims that he played a key role in causing the now-bankrupt car-rental company to file inaccurate financial statements in 2013.

Frissora pressured subordinates to “find money,” mainly by re-analyzing reserve accounts, as Hertz’s financial results fell short of forecasts in 2013, the Securities and Exchange Commission said in a statement Thursday. He also kept older cars in the company’s rental fleet longer to lower depreciation costs without disclosing the change to investors, the SEC said.

Hertz reaffirmed earnings guidance in November 2013 despite internal projections that showed lower earnings per share figures, according to the SEC. The company then revised the results in 2014 and restated them in 2015, cutting previously reported pretax income by $235 million, the SEC said. Hertz agreed to pay…

Western Europe’s electrified vehicle sales pulled ahead of China’s last month after countries including Germany and France boosted government subsidies to stimulate demand that had been decimated by the pandemic.

The roughly 500,000 plug-in hybrid and battery-electric vehicles registered in Europe during the first seven months exceeded China’s sales by about 14,000 units, according to a report from Matthias Schmidt, an independent auto analyst in Berlin.

Registrations of battery-powered cars were about 269,000 in western Europe and plug-in registrations were 231,000, according to the report.

In addition to helping automakers recover from the coronavirus, government incentives are assisting automakers’ efforts to meet tougher emissions standards.

While China’s auto market has been recovering, the government is reducing subsidies that have supported new-energy vehicle sales to encourage automakers to compete on their own.

Europe probably will…

General Motors plans to hand off ventilator production at its Indiana parts facility to Ventec Life Systems by the end of the month as it completes its government contract to build 30,000 ventilators to help treat coronavirus patients.

GM has delivered more than 20,000 ventilators to the National Stockpile and expects to send the remaining 10,000 by the end August, said spokesman Dan Flores. Ventec, a ventilator company based near Seattle, will lease GM's Kokomo, Ind., facility to continue mass producing the ventilators for hospitals across the U.S., GM said.

In early April, the Trump administration announced a $490 million contract with GM to deliver the 30,000 ventilators — more than double the number in the Strategic National Stockpile at the time — by August. A week later, GM and Ventec began mass producing the ventilators out of the Kokomo facility.

GM and Ventec had already partnered and sourced parts from GM's supply base befo…

A California judge on Thursday refused to give Uber Technologies Inc. and Lyft Inc. more time to appeal his decision forcing them to classify drivers in that state as employees, which they have said would necessitate restructuring their businesses.

At a hearing in San Francisco Superior Court, Judge Ethan Schulman said he found no reason to extend his Aug. 20 deadline for the ride-hailing companies to appeal the preliminary injunction he issued on Monday before it could take effect.

"I am unconvinced that any extension of the 10-day stay is required," Schulman said. "Both applications are denied."

Uber and Lyft have said they will appeal.

The injunction came in a lawsuit where California and the cities of Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco accused Uber and Lyft of violating Assembly Bill 5, a new state law making it harder to treat "gig" workers as independent contractors.

Uber and Lyft prefer using that classification for drivers, be…

Toyota and Mazda said Thursday they will pour another $830 million into their joint manufacturing plant under construction in Huntsville, Ala., to boost production efficiency at what had been a $1.6 billion plant slated to start making new crossovers next year.

The added investment, which the automakers said would be used to "incorporate more cutting-edge manufacturing technologies into its production lines and provide enhanced training" to its 4,000 planned workers, boosts the total investment to $2.33 billion. It also represents a roughly 50 percent increase in its planned costs less than a year before it is due to start producing new compact crossovers for both Mazda and Toyota.

Construction of the plant, which was announced in 2018, was slightly delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic, but Toyota says that most work has been completed on its roof, walls, floor, ductwork and fire protection.

The automakers revealed no further details of …

With the arrival of summer, traditionally a slack season for sales, new-vehicle dealerships in China saw their average backlog rise to a nearly two-month supply in July. Average stockpiles at dealerships increased to 57 days last month, up from 52 days the previous month, the China Automobile Dealers Association said.

Stores marketing Chinese brands reported the biggest inventory burden, at 64 days’ supply, up from 62 days in June.

The average backlog of dealerships stocking domestically built, foreign mass-market brands grew to 59 days from 53 a month earlier.

Inventories at stores distributing luxury brands and imported foreign brands jumped to 50 days from 41 the previous month. 

The highest average dealership backlog in July, at 106 days, was reported by Jaguar Land Rover. 

It was followed by a 92-day supply of vehicles at Beijing Hyundai stores – Hyundai Motor Co.’s joint venture with BAIC Motor Co. – and …

Tesla Inc. established a brokerage in Shanghai that will offer auto insurance to Chinese buyers.

The brokerage, with registered capital of 50 million yuan ($7.2 million), is wholly owned by Tesla’s Hong Kong subsidiary, according to Tianyancha, a Beijing-based website that tracks registration information of Chinese businesses.

The legal representative of the insurance brokerage is Zhu Xiaotong, a global vice president at Tesla, who is in charge of the U.S. electric vehicle maker’s operations in the greater China region.

Additional information about the brokerage was not available. 

The EV maker has begun offering auto insurance in California, where rates are generally high and a deterrent to Tesla ownership, the company has said.

It also plans to offer insurance that taps internal data from its AutoPilot driver-assist system to help reduce rates.

Analysts say Tesla could offer lower insurance rates because AutoPilot will decreas…

SHANGHAI – After the coronavirus outbreak was brought under control in March, new-vehicle sales swung back – increasing 4.4 percent in April after a 42 percent slump in first quarter. 

By July, the market had racked up four straight monthly gains. 

Now, there are signs that the rebound may be about to end. In the first 10 days of August, vehicle sales at all foreign automakers producing in China and 11 major domestic auto manufacturers, which account for nearly all output in China, slumped 18 percent to some 384,000, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers said Thursday. 

During the period, light-vehicle sales at the top producers fell 18 percent to roughly 357,000 while commercial-vehicle deliveries declined 11 percent to about 26,000. 

Could sales rally in the final weeks of the month?

In theory, they could. But rising inventory levels at dealerships signal some consumers may be taking a break. 

…

BERLIN -- Daimler reached an agreement to settle U.S. proceedings relating to investigations into software to cheat diesel emissions tests that will result in costs of about $1.5 billion, the German carmaker said Thursday.

The maker of Mercedes-Benz cars said it expects an impact on its free cash flow over the next three years as a result, with the main impact within the next 12 months.

"With the proposed settlements, the company takes an important step towards legal certainty with respect to various diesel proceedings in the United States," it said in a statement.

German carmakers, among the global leaders in diesel technology, have been caught in the crosshairs of courts and regulators after Volkswagen Group admitted in 2015 to using engine control devices to skirt diesel emission tests.

The scandal triggered a global backlash against diesel vehicles that so far has cost VW 30 billion euros ($35.45 billion) in fines, penalties, vehicle buyback…

Mich. explores dedicated lanes for autonomous, connected vehicles

Michigan leaders intend to place connected and autonomous vehicles in the fast lane toward the future.

With an eye toward embracing industry R&D efforts, the state said Thursday it has embarked on efforts to sketch a corridor between Detroit and Ann Arbor loaded with infrastructure that can speed deployment and enables safe movement of these vehicles.

Chiefly, renderings for the project — which will explore the viability of building such a corridor — depict the creation of dedicated lanes reserved for connected and autonomous vehicles that are separated from human traffic by "separation barriers" that "ensure safety and efficiency," according to Cavnue.

Cavnue, a subsidiary of Sidewalk Infrastructure Partners — itself a division of Alphabet Inc., Google's parent company — will run the exploratory project along with Google subsidiary Sidewalk Labs, the company's urban digitaliz…

Michigan leaders intend to place connected and autonomous vehicles in the fast lane toward the future.

With an eye toward embracing industry R&D efforts, the state said Thursday it has embarked on efforts to sketch a corridor between Detroit and Ann Arbor loaded with infrastructure that can speed deployment and enables safe movement of these vehicles.

Chiefly, renderings for the project — which will explore the viability of building such a corridor — depict the creation of dedicated lanes reserved for connected and autonomous vehicles that are separated from human traffic by "separation barriers" that "ensure safety and efficiency," according to Cavnue.

Cavnue, a subsidiary of Sidewalk Infrastructure Partners — itself a division of Alphabet Inc., Google's parent company — will run the exploratory project along with Google subsidiary Sidewalk Labs, the company's urban digitalization platform.

Officials say they will evaluate the potential of th…

Online used-vehicle seller Vroom said Wednesday that decreased demand and uncertainty around vehicle pricing in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic led the company to reduce inventory in the first half of the second quarter.

Vroom's second-quarter net loss widened to $63.2 million from $33.3 million during the same period last year. Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes and other adjustments in the quarter dropped to a loss of $39 million from a loss of $29.8 million.

Revenue slipped 3 percent to $253.1 million. It was Vroom's first quarterly earnings report since going public in June.

"I am pleased with our results for the second quarter, in which we performed substantially ahead of our growth plan, and I am encouraged by both the continued validation of the Vroom model and the performance of our employees in a tough environment," Vroom CEO Paul Hennessy said in a statement.

Vroom's total e-commerce revenue increased 45 percent to $175.6…