The discussion covers Sterling Anderson's potential rise to GM CEO, highlighting his background in autonomous tech and EV development, including GM's lithium manganese rich batteries. European auto stocks, particularly Renault, are seen as undervalued investment opportunities due to strategic moves and strong balance sheets. The episode also explores China's crackdown on zero kilometer used car exports, the ongoing debate over stop-start technology in fuel economy standards, and new vehicle launches like Kia's K4 Hatchback and the electric Ford Bronco in China. Tesla's Cybertruck sales struggles and SpaceX's bulk purchases are also examined.
Topics:sterling anderson gm ceo speculationeuropean auto stock investmentsrenault business strategychina zero kilometer car export rulesstop start technology debatekia k4 hatchback pricingelectric ford bronco chinatesla cybertruck salesgm lithium manganese rich batteriesus japan trade relations
- Time to Invest in European Auto Stocks? - Renault Regains Investment Rating - Sterling Anderson Could Be GM’s Next CEO - Toyota To Export U.S.-Made Models to Japan - China to Block “Used” Car Exports - The Battle Over Stop-Start Tech - Kia K4 Starts Under $26,000 - China Ford Bronco BEV and EREV Priced to Sell - SpaceX Buys 1,000 Cybertrucks - Last Autoline Daily Of 2025
"... to compete with other off road focused SUVs. The cybertruck is selling well below expectations, and I think t..."
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Speaker 1: This is Auto Line Daily, the show dedicated to enthusiasts of the global automotive industry. There's an old saying about
how to invest in the auto industry. When automakers are
in deep trouble and the situation looks hopeless, that's when you buy their stock. And when sales are going through
the roof and they're raking in the profits, that's when you sell. That's why it's fascinating to see that a
European investment fund called Divas Asset Management is buying up stock from Mercedes Benz and the supplier for via, Divas seems to know what it's doing. Over the last five years,
it's delivered twenty percent returns per year to its investors, and it's investing in European automotive stocks because it believes.
Speaker 2: They're at the bottom and won't go any lower.
Speaker 1: Even more interesting, it says that if the overall stock market takes a nosedive, autos won't be hurt because none of the big investment firms are heavily invested into autos, and so you won't see them dumping shares.
Speaker 2: As if to drive that point.
Speaker 1: Home, Renault was just upgraded to investment status by SMP Global Ratings that bumped the stock up almost three percent after a drop twenty three percent this year. Renault seems
to be managing its operations very astutely. It spun off
its powertrain operations into Horse, a startup that it created which now makes engines for Volvo, Gli, Mercedes, and Nissan and expects to land other automakers. Renault also just signed
a deal to co develop small evs with Ford, and it has a strong balance sheet and decent free cash flow.
Put it all together, and that's why SMP upgraded its investment rating. Could Sterling Anderson be the next CEO of
General Motors?
Speaker 2: That's the buzz in Detroit.
Speaker 1: The forty five year old now oversees all product and software development at GM, and if those products are successful, he could go all the way to the top. Before
joining GM, Anderson worked at Aurora, the company developing autonomous technology for semi trucks, and before that he was at Tesla, where he worked on autopilot in the model as. Anderson
told Bloomberg that GM will continue to push ahead with eves rather than risk falling behind Tesla and the Chinese.
He says it would be shortsighted for GM to focus only on internal combustion cars just for the sake of short term profitability. He's also very bullish on GM's push
into LMR or lithium manganese rich batteries. Anderson says they'll
allow GM to cut the cost of the EV versions of the Silverado pickup and escalate SUV by ten thousand bucks.
The Trump administration wants to narrow the trade deficit with Japan.
Last year, Japan's trade surplus with the US was nearly sixty billion dollars, and eighty two percent of that gap was Japan's SERPA plus on cars and parts. So to
help improve the trade relations between the US and Japan, Toyota is going to start selling USBI Cameris, Highlanders, and Hundreds in Japan next year. The Camri and Highlander were
previously sold in the country. Toyota stopped Camri sales in
twenty twenty three, and the Highlander was sold until two thousand and seven under the Klugar name. Well, here's our
auto line insight. These vehicles likely won't sell very well
because if Toyota thought they could do well, it would already be selling them in the country.
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Speaker 1: China is issuing new rules to crack down on the sale and export of what are called zero kilometer cars.
These are vehicles that leave the factory with zero or little mileage, but are then sold through used car channels at discount and the prices. The practice is done to
help ease China's over capacity issue, but the government wants to stop it because it hurts dealer profits the value of vehicles, and many that are exported don't have proper localization or after sales coverage. Industry experts estimate that a
million zero kilometer used vehicles were sold in China last year, and zero kilometer exports are expected to be more than five hundred thousand units this year, which is about seventy to eighty percent of all the exported used vehicles.
Speaker 2: So the government just issued new rules that go into.
Speaker 1: Effect on January first, that require any vehicle exported within one hundred and eighty days of initial registration must include an after sales service confirmation document issued by the manufacturer.
The document must specify the export destination vehicle information and feature the manufacturer's official seal. As you may remember, earlier
this year, EPA administrator Lee Zelden blasted stop start technology, saying quote everyone hates it and that the agency is quote fixing it. But Knitz's new proposed fuel economy rules
project the continued use of stop start. It expects that
around thirty percent of twenty thirty one model year vehicles will be equipped with a twelve volt non hybrid version of the technology. While that's down from the thirty eight
percent of twenty twenty six model year vehicles that are equipped with it, it's still much higher than it would be under the Biden administration's rules. Stop start adoption under
Biden's rules was estimated to be six percent because the standards were stricter, which would have required automakers to use different technology to meet them. Kia revealed pricing for its
sleek new K four Hatchback for the US market. There's
three trim lines available that range in starting price from about twenty six thousand to thirty thousand dollars including destination charges.
We first got to check out this vehicle back in August, and if you'd like a quick rundown of what the K four Hatchback is all about, we'll post a link to the video that we posted at that time. Speaking
of vehicle pricing, Car News China reports that the electric Ford Bronco for the Chinese market will cost between roughly thirty two thousand and forty thousand dollars. While its dimensions
are pretty much the same as the forder version of the US Bronco, it looks like everything else from the facia to the body panels to the interior have all been redone by Chinese designers. It also only features be
Ev and EREV power trains. The pure Ev version has
a roughly one hundred and five kilowatt hour battery pack and two electric motors that put out four hundred and forty.
Speaker 2: Five horse power.
Speaker 1: The Erev has a one and a half liter gas engine, a nearly forty four kilowatt hour battery, and two electric motors that combine for about four hundred and fifteen horse power.
Despite all the differences to the US version, the Chinese Bronco is still meant to compete with other off road focused SUVs. The cybertruck is selling well below expectations, and
I think that's putting it nicely. Tesla tooled up to
make between two hundred and two hundred and fifty thousand units a year, but while it bundles Model S and X with the Cybertruck, Electric estimates that it will struggle to sell twenty thousand this year, and it also says that if it weren't for SpaceX, which is owned by Elon Musk, that Cybertruck number would be even lower. Its
source claims that SpaceX has purchased over one thousand cyber trucks and could buy more than two thousand over time, although with pictures and videos of hundreds of cyber trucks sitting in SpaceX parking lots, it doesn't seem like they're getting any use, but it is a nice little bump in sales and revenue for Tesla, and that brings us to the end of today's show and actually to the end of the year. While we'll post little things here
and there, this was our final Autoline Daily for twenty twenty five. So I'd like to say a humungous thank
you to everyone out there. Thank you for watching, thank
you for your comments, your likes, and your subscribes, and a special thank you to all our Patreon and YouTube members.
We'll see you again after the new year. Write in
time for CEES.
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