Trade News

MILAN -- The heirs of the late Fiat Chrysler Automobiles CEO Sergio Marchionne received shares in the automaker worth at least 21.6 million euros ($23.5 million) in 2019, according to FCA's annual report.

FCA’s current CEO, Mike Manley, received compensation totaling 13.28 million euros ($14.45 million).

The sum received by the heirs also was more than the compensation package of General Motors CEO Mary Barra, who received $21.6 million last year.

FCA said the 1,951,457 shares were delivered as part of its employment agreement with Marchionne, who died at age 66 on July 24, 2018, in Switzerland after being hospitalized a few weeks earlier. Prior to his death, Marchionne was also CEO and chairman of Ferrari.

The shares were awarded "as a result of overachievement of performance objectives for the 2014-2018 performance period," said FCA's annual report, which was filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Feb. 25.

Th…

The length of almost two football fields, the cargo ship Jupiter Spirit arrived in Los Angeles’ harbor on April 24 after an almost three-week journey from Japan, ready to unload its cargo of about 2,000 Nissan Armada SUVs, Rogue crossovers and Infiniti sedans in a quick, half-day operation.

But when the ship, operated by Nissan Motor Co.’s freight arm, got about a mile offshore, its captain was ordered to drop anchor. And there the ship remained for almost a week -- a floating symbol of an unprecedented logjam as nearby storage lots covering hundreds of acres overflowed with vehicles that Americans suddenly have little desire to purchase.

There are gluts of all shapes and kinds forming in the U.S. nowadays, a testament to the scope of the economic pain the coronavirus is inflicting. Slaughterhouses are killing and tossing out thousands of pigs a day, dairy farmers are pouring away milk, oil sellers were paying buyers to take barrels off their hands last week, …

Toyota Motor Corp. and Hyundai posted sharply lower U.S. sales in April, previewing what is expected to be a low point for automakers as the market reels from closed showrooms and government restrictions on household and business activity because of the COVID-19 outbreak.

Volume dropped 54 percent at Toyota Motor, with demand down the same amount at the Toyota division and Lexus. Overall, the automaker's truck deliveries slid 50 percent and car sales dropped 61 percent -- even as the company's average new-vehicle incentive rose 24 percent to $2,551 last month. (See chart below.)

The Toyota division's top-selling vehicles all posted declines of 30 percent or more: Camry, down 62 percent; Corolla, off 53 percent; RAV4, down 56 percent; Tacoma, off 30 percent and Highlander, down 64 percent.

U.S. sales fell 39 percent at Hyundai, one of the hotter brands in recent quarters because of an expanded crossover lineup, with light-truck deliveries off 13 percent t…

Consumers are continuing to prioritize auto expenses ahead of other payments, a credit bureau study finds, despite record job losses and shelter-in-place orders preventing many consumers from driving beyond trips to the grocery store or to seek medical care.

Those financially affected by COVID-19 closures were about twice as likely to default on a mortgage than an auto payment, maintaining historical trends of ranking transportation needs above other credit products, according to the survey of nearly 3,000 U.S. consumers conducted by TransUnion.

Charlie Wise, head of global research and consulting at TransUnion, said U.S. consumers who have lost jobs or hours during the pandemic are not willing to turn over their keys just yet.

"The recognition many consumers have is, this isn't going to be forever," Wise said. "At some point, we will be let out of our homes. When that call comes, I don't want to be without a car."

About 61 percent of respondent…

Delivery's time to shine?

Coronavirus has wrought significant changes across the transportation landscape. Among them: a renewed focus on using autonomous-driving technology for delivery services.

On April 7, self-driving startup Nuro received a permit to test its driverless delivery vehicles on certain California roads.

Now comes the Yandex Rover.

On Wednesday, Russian tech titan Yandex launched a commercial rollout of its Rover delivery robot. The company deployed the six-wheeled sidewalk vehicle that's about as big as a cooler, in Skolkovo, a tech-minded suburb of Moscow. It's the first deployment of the Rover, which began road testing in November, outside the company's private campuses.

Employees of city offices will be the first to use the app-based delivery service, and the Rovers will travel "several kilometers" between buildings on public sidewalks. Along these trips, the Rover will meet pedestrians, cross streets and encoun…

LONDON -- Nissan will resume vehicle production at its U.K. plant in early June, the automaker said in a statement.

The plant is the largest car factory in the U.K. and Nissan's largest in Europe. The Qashqai and Juke crossovers, and the Leaf electric car, are built at the facility in Sunderland, northeast England. Production fell 22 percent to 346,535 units last year.

Vehicle production at the plant was halted March 13 due to the coronavirus outbreak. About 150 employees returned to work last week to begin engine production, Nissan said.

Nissan is waiting to see how car sales recover before ramping up the factory to full production.

"Our goal is to navigate through this crisis while maintaining activities critical for business continuity and to make sure we are prepared for the time when business resumes in Europe," the company said.

Nissan will reopen its other European assembly plant in Barcelona, Spain, on May 4, it said last week.

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Hear Mark Fields’ views on the industry’s return to normalcy. He also looks at the future of retailing, manufacturing, electrification and investments in autonomous driving.

Speakers:Jason Stein, Publisher, Automotive NewsMark Fields, Senior Advisor, TPG Capital

This conversation was originally broadcast on April 30, 2020 at 11am EDT as part of our Congress Conversations series. The series runs through June 4. Register to watch future Congress Conversations live at http://autonews.com/congress.

After a monthlong shutdown, BMW on Monday plans to crank up the lines at its largest assembly plant in the world, the automaker said Wednesday.

BMW's plant in Spartanburg, S.C., which employs 11,000 people, joins Hyundai and Kia in hoping to restart after efforts to contain the spread of the coronavirus shuttered auto manufacturing across the nation.

Toyota and Volkswagen were expected to restart their factories May 4 but have since pushed back the start date.

BMW's German rival Mercedes-Benz holds the distinction of beating the industry in getting back to business. Daimler's Vance, Ala., assembly plant opened April 27. The factory, which builds the GLE crossover, GLS SUV and C-Class sedan, began operating with one shift.

BMW's 7 million-square-foot South Carolina plant builds the popular X-Series crossovers. About 70 percent of production volume is exported to around 125 markets worldwide, with China being the biggest.

Next week's restart …

Join Automotive News Publisher Jason Stein for a daily podcast series about the coronavirus crisis. He’ll speak with industry experts, insiders and Automotive News reporters about how the virus is impacting and reshaping the automotive industry.

TI Fluid Systems' Bill Kozyra weighs in on restarting the industry; implementing an "extensive" list of safety protocols; how the supplier "beat the rush" to protect employees from the virus.

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In a sign of how the coronavirus is changing car buying, millions of potential Tesla Inc. customers in China just tuned in to a celebrity-led online livestream touting the U.S. company’s vehicles.

Almost 4 million viewers watched the hour-long show on the Taobao shopping platform on Tuesday afternoon, seeing livestreamer and influencer Viya demonstrate Tesla features from the music player to air conditioning, even climbing in to the cargo space of a Model S sedan to show how spacious it is. Viewers were asked to book test drives through the site, with a sales rep calling back within 48 hours to make the arrangements.

Desperate to revive sales decimated by the virus outbreak, carmakers and dealers in China are betting on novel ways to attract customers. Buyers in the world’s biggest auto market are gradually warming to the idea of buying big-ticket items like cars via apps, social media and livestreaming sites that have become an important part of the e-commerce…

Dana Inc. said Thursday that weaker demand in a key segment and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic weighed on its first-quarter sales and profits.

The axles and transmission supplier said sales fell nearly 11 percent to $1.93 billion in the quarter.

A sluggish heavy-vehicle market in January and February and production halts across all mobility markets in March as a result of the global response to COVID-19 impacted sales, the company said.

Dana reported net income of $38 million, down 61 percent from the same period last year. This includes a goodwill impairment charge of $51 million resulting from the impact of the virus, the company said.

First-quarter adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization dropped 20 percent to $205 million. Dana said cost management helped mitigate the margin impact of the sales decline in the first quarter.

Dana joins several suppliers that have reported earnings during the crisis. Ma…

FRANKFURT -- Continental is postponing the planned listing of its powertrain unit Vitesco Technologies, citing ongoing economic uncertainty.

Shareholders will not be asked to sign off on the plans for a Vitesco spinoff at the annual general meeting on July 14 and the deal will not take place this year, Continental said in a statement on Thursday.

"We are now arranging the organizational and procedural requirements so that Continental and Vitesco Technologies are in a position to swiftly implement the spinoff with listing once the market environment is suitable. The decisive preparations for this will have been completed by the end of the year," Vitesco CEO Andreas Wolf said.

With the listing, Continental is hoping to capitalize on the industry's rapid move toward electrification. By 2025, Vitesco expects 40 percent of all powertrains to be electrified because of a combination of tougher global emissions regulations and rising consumer demand.

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