DAILY: Rivian Boosts R2 Plans, Global EV Sales Reach New Record and Tax Credit Changes Hit GM | 16 Oct 2025

This holiday season reached for the one butter that never disappoints,

Kerrygold. Made with milk from grass-fed cows on Irish family farms,

it's rich, creamy, and perfect for baking. Whether browning butter for cookies

or crafting the flakiest pie crust, Kerrygold's high butterfat content

makes all the difference in flavor and texture.

Holiday treats will taste extraordinary. As the holidays approach, it's time to

return to the classics. Flaky pie crusts, perfectly browned butter,

and cookies with just the right texture. And one ingredient you cannot compromise

on is Kerrygold butter. Kerrygold butter is crafted with milk

from grass-fed cows that graze on lush green pastures

across family farms in Ireland. The result?

A rich, creamy butter with a high butterfat content

that elevates every recipe. Whether you're making signature shortbread

or browning butter for a nutty depth in your pecan pie,

Kerrygold makes all the difference. The flavor is unmatched,

and the texture it brings to baked goods is simply

divine. So this holiday season, if you're baking for loved ones

or just for yourself, reach for Kerrygold. It's the butter of choice,

and your pies, your cookies, and your cakes will thank you.

Increase their estimates. Previously, they said that it'll do 155,000 R2s.

Next year, projected alongside 85,000 of the R1s and R1s' R1Ts.

And they got about 65,000 vans as well. This week, the CEO, R.J. Scarridge,

said the plant will be able to make up to 175,000 R2 vehicles. That's 20,000

more than the previous projection. But that's at the detriment of the R1s.

Not making more vehicles overall. And that's kind of understandable because,

you know, I think that if there are 60, 85,000 people, whatever it was that wanted an R1

vehicle, they've probably got one by now. And I think there's so much excitement around the R2s.

The factory has already produced hundreds of production intent builds, he said,

undergoing retooling at the moment for full-scale manufacturing, though Scarridge,

called the early ramp modest, said that the first step is moving from less than 50,000 R2s per year.

Rivian reaffirmed the normal plant's annual capacity is in total 215,000 units and said the

higher R2 forecast is because of things like supply chains being localized, strategically

located next to Rivian, things like a 1.2 million square foot supplier park in normal,

that allows major partners the likes of OP Mobility. They make the components like the

bumpers directly on site right next to where the vehicles are made. R2 deliveries will begin in

the first half of next year. Starting price will be $45,000 eventually. That won't be the first car

out of the factory doors. It'll start with higher price trims, but they will come, we think, before

the end of next year. Now, this is great news. Global deliveries of BEVs and plug-in hybrids.

BEV is battery electric vehicle, by the way, if you're new to the podcast. I record 2.1 million

in September. This is global. This is all plug-in vehicles and it's 2.1 million in a single month.

That's compared to the same month last year. 26% higher, led by strong demand in China,

Europe and, of course, the expiration of the tax credit in the United States brought forward

some sales. China accounted for 1.3 million vehicles as September, typically the country's

busiest buying month, saw consumers accelerate purchases to use trade-in subsidies before some

regional phase-outs as well. North America posting a monthly high as US buyers rushed

to claim the expiring federal tax credit. Now, the organization Row Motion has warned that demand

will fall sharply in Q4s. Consumers and businesses lose access to the incentives, but I'm no expert.

I disagree, actually, and I'll tell you why in one of the following stories.

Europe reached a new monthly peak as well. In Europe, 427,541 plug-in vehicles,

that's up 36% year on year. Strong demand in the UK, strong demand in Germany. Model Y had some really

good offers on in the quarter as well. Chinese brands like BYD and JQ are gaining popularity

in Europe and the UK, with models like the BYD CLU and the JQ7 achieving top 10 status amongst

all cars, not just EVs. These family-oriented SUVs and crossovers are affordable, they're functional,

and they cater to the mass market. Now, General Motors will record a $1.6 billion hit,

a charge. After scaling back their US EV manufacturing capacity, talking about expectations

of slower US EV adoption than were predicted years ago when these predictions were made,

the filing says $1.2 billion in a non-cash impairment and other charges from EV capacity

adjustments and $0.4 billion in cash charges related to contract cancellation fees. That's a

big deal in the supply chain if you many years ago have contracts in place and now you need to

adjust them or even cancel them. There is a cost to that, of course. GM said late last year that

they were, are you ready for this? GM said they were variable profit positive on their electric

vehicles. What does variable profit positive mean? I think it means that selling above the

variable costs. So anything it cost to make the vehicle, so the materials, the labor,

they're all variable costs to put a car in your driveway. It doesn't cover the capex, the fixed

costs, building the factories and putting machinery inside them. And so higher production

hasn't increased its losses there, but they're not overall profitable on their electric vehicle

programs. Now let's talk SK. Again, in terms of some of the projections made post lockdowns when

it was kind of almost giddy, we're all going to be driving EVs in the next five minutes,

lots of battery investment in the United States and some of that battery capacity is now being

used not for electric vehicles until the market perhaps catches up, but for energy storage. And

that's fascinating, isn't it? So SK on the South Korean company is expanding its LFP,

that's lithium ion phosphate capacity in Georgia. After signing a four year,

a $1.4 billion deal with a Colorado firm, which I think is called Flatiron Energy Development,

or maybe Flatiron Energy to supply 7.2 gigawatt hours delivery start next year.

SK will convert part of their NMC battery lines at their plant in Georgia. So NMC is or NCM,

nickel cobalt manganese, it's chemistry, which EV batteries have typically been made out of outside

of China. LFP lithium ion phosphate is cheaper, great for mass production of LFP cells in the

United States in the second half of next year. And it's sometimes a lot cheaper as well. The

conversion creates a dual chemistry facility. It's really important they can adjust to the

market then can't they? So SK and LG are going to be the only battery makers with a North American

plant that can make both. LFP is capturing the US energy storage market as tariffs on Chinese

made cells, which right now a 41% next year, there'll be 58.4% mean China's cells are less

cost competitive. And actually it puts US cells or China cells all around $85 to $90 per kilowatt

hour for energy storage. So you might as well buy the US made ones. Now great wall motor is

relaunching in Europe and you push with a revised product strategy and the same dealer based sales

model focusing on SUVs under their Haval brand. Great wall motors first arrived in Europe in

2021 with two BEVs and two plug-in hybrids. They were SUVs, but the results I'll be kind. We'll

call them modest. In 2023 they sold 316,000 vehicles outside of China, but in Europe only

6,300 and they closed their European headquarters in Munich. The lineup has been

reprioritized to add hybrids alongside pure BEVs and plug-in hybrids. And they say they're

still investing in the European market. They want to spotlight Haval, H-A-V-A-L, Haval,

Haval in other markets as well. And that'll be their focus going forward over here.

Now let's get back to this story about the United States and the federal tax credit because there's

a lot has been said about how many people think that the US is going to enter the dark ages

for electrification. And who am I to argue with the likes of, well, very well-informed people,

like the CEO of Ford, for instance. Jim Farley thinks that the new car market in the US could go

from 10% EVs to 5%. And Rome Motion, who I mentioned a little while ago, said it's going to fall off

very steeply this quarter. I think we should, let's wait and see, should we? Because despite the

federal tax credit going, which is undoubtedly a short-term pain in the backside, automakers and

dealers have actually kept the pricing, the incentives pretty substantial. The director of

Insider Edmunds, Ivan Drury, Drury, saying the dollar for dollar, you can't find a better deal

on an equivalent ICE vehicle than if you buy an EV. General Motors gives about $6,000 of net savings,

which is, I know, not much less than you were getting before with the federal tax credit.

Several models from Ford now have 0% APR and cashback, like the Ford F-150 Lightning,

Kia's EV6, EV9, 0%. Ford, credit, offering 0% for 72 months on the Mustang Mach-E.

Stellantis, well, they're matching the $7,500 now-expired federal tax credit on existing stock

of plug-in hybrids and bevs, and some bonus cash for leases and purchases as well. Hyundai's doing

the same amount for their IONIQ 5 and last year, and this year's model years, or 2026 model years,

and a notable lease example is something like the Chevy Blazer, so $1,500 down,

which is not a huge amount of money. I'm not a huge fan of putting any money down on a car,

but if you've got to put some down, okay, $1,500, and then $299 a month for two years to lease a

Blazer, a great vehicle. Although I don't lease vehicles, so I can't tell you whether that's a

stellar deal or not. $300 per month for a Blazer in your driveway, if that's

for you, it seems like a good deal to me. So I'm not so convinced with this theory

that the US is about to walk its way backwards to combustion. You can't put the genie back in the

bottle, and people know EVs are just better. I think this is also some short-term pain that'll

shake its way out. Anyway, let's talk about China. They have asked the World Trade Organization

to help with a situation in India over New Delhi's subsidies in EV and battery sectors.

China's Ministry of Commerce said on Wednesday this week a ministry spokesperson said the measures

breach WTO obligations, like the national treatment principle, which I'll confess I'm not

familiar with, but it's about import substitution subsidies, which is prohibited under WTO rules.

They say it harms China's legitimate interests and they want some resolution to this. I think China

has done, if anything, over the last 20 years, certainly used all of their power and pulled

every possible lever to subsidize and incentivize the EV industry, whether that's cheap money to

build factories and there's a massive oversupply problem in China, whether that is encouraging

people to buy domestic products through various means and not a foreign product. Other countries

are saying, well, China do this and so we'll have some of the same. Maybe it's not exactly like for

like, as I'm no economist, but China complaining over countries giving help to their industries is

somewhat pot kettle and black. Now let's talk about EVs in the UK. A new data point coming out

of the comparison website compare the market. They say that EVs cost £350 a year less than a

comparative combustion car. That's good. That's important to always compare like for like, by the

way, I've seen that from people saying, well, EVs aren't cheaper because, you know, if you compare

a little Toyota Igo or something to a city, a segment small car and a Tesla Model S, well,

they're about the same price to run. If you look at the insurance and this, okay, so let's not do

that. Let's do comparative models like for like, which is what you need to do. If you look at the

insurance, the tax and to fuel the thing, and they say that it's £350 a year cheaper to drive an EV,

but that doesn't include service. They ignored any kind of service. And of course, that is a

really, really big issue, maybe not for a brand new car, because hopefully new cars don't need

service. And hopefully they're all under warranty that doesn't get, you know, any kind of pushback

if something goes wrong in the first three years. Look, a lot of EVs. I've got seven, eight, nine.

I've seen a 10 year warranty coming out of China. Hopefully they're good for that. Still around in

10 years. But if you are driving combustion cars any period of time, well, then service does start

to kick in. You do start to need oil changes and catalytic converters and all the oily, greasy bits

that eventually will want to bump into each other in unfortunate ways. And you have to try and,

you know, stop that happening. And so, you know, keep the engine running smoothly. That's a very

expensive hobby. If you really love your petrol and diesel, which you just don't get with electric

vehicles, anything that can go wrong with an EV is something that's big, which is why I've got a

third party warranty on my Polestar because I don't really want a surprise bill. I don't mind

paying for a warranty. My Polestar is five years old now. And if anything goes wrong with it,

I know that I'm covered. Could I save some money? Yeah, absolutely.

Am I worried about small things going wrong with it? No, not at all. Cars are mechanical.

And we've seen this with some of the older Teslas now. Some of the mechanical bits,

not the motors, although some have been replaced, obviously, and batteries have been replaced.

But some of those mechanical bits that keep the wheels on the ground wear out. And that's

absolutely fine. It's a machine that's going to need servicing, but not in the way that a

combustion car needs servicing. So now they're interesting data point there.

Right, a new factory in Romania is starting the electric drive unit assembly for the GLC

from Mercedes-Benz, which says it's getting closer. A Star Assembly is a wholly owned subsidiary of

Mercedes-Benz. They've now started making the EDU's electric drive units for their all new,

all electric Mercedes-Benz GLC. They make them in Romania, and then they send them over to the

factories where they are made. I didn't make notes on that. I think it is, I'm not quite sure

where the GLC is going. Bremen, maybe. They make the GLC and ship it to Bremen where they'll make

that. GLC looks like a fantastic new all electric vehicle. And so the fact that they're spinning

up all those things right now, like making the drive units, which are all integrated at the

electric motor, the power electronics and the gear units as well, a complete system, and then ship

them off to the factory to be made tells me that, well, looks like serious production of the GLC

is very, very close, maybe the beginning of next year. New York is investing nearly $80 million

in zero emission buses. New York State is investing the money across seven regional transit providers

to accelerate the shift to zero emission buses, also supporting the infrastructure needed to

decarbonize. These awards come through the zero emission transit transition program launched

last year in December with $120 million in total in the pot out of the state's budget.

Regional transit authorities and municipal providers are part of the recipients in this

round. We'll take a quick break. A couple of stories when we come back and we will talk

about spidirectional wallboxes and solar plus storage. Stick around back in a moment.

As the holidays approach, it's time to return to the classics. Flaky pie crusts, perfectly browned

butter, and cookies with just the right texture. And one ingredient you cannot compromise on

is Kerrygold butter. Kerrygold butter is crafted with milk from grass-fed cows that graze on lush

green pastures across family farms in Ireland. The result? A rich, creamy butter with a high

butterfat content that elevates every recipe. Whether you're making signature shortbread

or browning butter for a nutty depth in your pecan pie, Kerrygold makes all the difference.

The flavor is unmatched, and the texture it brings to baked goods is simply divine. So this

holiday season, if you're baking for loved ones, or just for yourself, reach for Kerrygold. It's

the butter of choice, and your pies, your cookies, and your cakes will thank you.