+++ Americans love big pick-up trucks. It’s been that way for decades, and frankly, there’s nothing suggesting that will end anytime soon. However, the absolute dominance of FULL SIZE trucks in US driveways could be on the decline. That’s the biggest takeaway from Dave Cantin Group’s 2025 Market Outlook Report, which suggests the US market has reached ‘Peak Truck’. “What we’re seeing is consumer sediment beginning to change”, said Brian Gordon, chief business and strategy officer at the Dave Cantin Group. “So, this isn’t Americans walking away from all their trucks and SUVs and falling back in love with the sedan. This is a trend that is really spurred by affordability and the challenges Americans are having with car payments”. The crux of this conclusion comes from surveys the company conducted with both consumers and dealerships. The results showed fewer people intended to buy full-size trucks and SUVs. Of course, there’s way more to all this than just a survey. Perusing sales data for America’s top-selling pickup trucks, we see the Ford F-Series is up a whopping 24.5 percent so far in 2025. GMC Sierra sales are also up by 14.5 percent, while Chevrolet Silverado sales are almost steady, with a 1.2-percent drop. The only full-size American truck to show a hefty decline is the Ram, down 11.8 percent through the first 3 months of the year. That could be attributed to the slow rollout of the updated 2025 model and its lack of a V8 option. Taking an even deeper look into the past, 2024 was Ford’s best year for the F-Series since before the Covid pandemic, and one of its best sales years in 2 decades. Last year was also strong for Chevrolet and GMC. Only Ram took a big hit, but it appears to be an outlier among its Detroit-based competitors. If Americans are losing interest in full-size trucks, the sales data sure doesn’t show it. Or does it? Moving beyond full-size trucks, there’s a revolution happening in the mid-size truck segment. Chevrolet Colorado sales are up 73.3 percent so far this year. The GMC Canyon is up 65.9 percent. The Ford Ranger is up an astounding 677 percent, though it’s worth noting that Ford had some issues early last year that dampened Q1 2024 Ranger sales. Stepping outside Detroit, the Toyota Tacoma is up 177 percent. As for sedans, sales are indeed up for most of the brands that still offer them. The Hyundai Elantra is up 25 percent and the larger Sonata is up 20 percent. The Toyota Prius is up 25 percent, though the Camry, America’s best-selling sedan, is down 10.8 percent. Even Nissan, which is fighting for its life, saw sedan sales explode in the best possible way. The Sentra is up 36.1 percent and the Altima jumped 25.3 percent. Clearly, more time is needed to see if the Dave Cantin Group’s claim of “Peak Truck” comes to pass. And with tariffs throwing all kinds of instability into the market, 2025 could be a rough year to predict anything. Still, the survey results are interesting. And sales data certainly shows buyers flocking to smaller trucks and sedans. “Peak Truck is a really, really important concept to watch because we’re not sure how far that trend goes”, said Gordon. “But what we believe is, the longer the conditions on the ground stay the same or get worse from an economic perspective or an uncertainty perspective, consumers are going to continue to be more pragmatic in the choices they make in terms of the vehicles that they’re out there looking to purchase”. +++
+++ MARUTI SUZUKI , India’s largest carmaker, reported a smaller-than-expected quarterly profit as higher input costs and marketing spends outweighed a modest rise in sales. Net income fell 4.4% to 37.11 billion rupees ($434 million) for the quarter ended March 31, the firm said in a filing Friday. That fell short of the average profit of 38.57 billion rupees estimated by a survey of analysts. Revenue rose 6.4% to 406.7 billion rupees compared with the same period last year, missing estimates. Total costs advanced 8.6% to 373.3 billion rupees, with raw material costs surging almost 20%, the filing said. The disappointing earnings for the sector leader (it had a 41.5% local market share as of the end of March) come amid a broader consumption slack in the world’s most populous country which has clipped sales across the board from kitchen staples to SUVs. After clocking an average of 8% for 3 years, India’s growth slowed to 6.5% in the year ended March 31. The International Monetary Fund forecasts this will slip to 6.2% in the current fiscal year. “This year, the domestic market growth was quite muted”, the company said in the earnings statement. The Indian unit of Suzuki said earlier this month that domestic passenger vehicle demand growth is likely to be at just 1% to 2% for year through March 2026. Maruti posted a 3.5% increase in sales to 604.635 units, buoyed by a 8.1% surge in exports to 85.089 units in the quarter while domestic sales rose by just 2.8%. The company has been raising car prices too this year to pass on some of the pain from rising input costs and operational expenses. Operating margin was 8.7%, missing the analyst estimate of 9.9%. Margins were hurt by expenses at the new Kharkhoda plant, marketing costs and manufacturing overheads, Maruti said in an post-earnings presentation. The carmaker that sparked the affordable small-car revolution in India in the 1980s has been looking to make up for lost ground in the electric vehicle segment, where local rival Tata Motors dominates. Maruti’s first electric vehicle, the e-Vitara, which was unveiled at the India auto show in January, will hit the roads later this year. It also plans to roll out 5 more EVs by 2030. “India is our most important market, and our greatest focus”, Toshihiro Suzuki, chief executive officer of Maruti’s Japanese parent told reporters in February, undeterred by the recent tepid growth in the South Asian nation. Maruti also started its Kharkhoda plant in February in the northern Indian state of Haryana (its first new plant in 8 years) marking the first phase of what will become one of Asia’s largest passenger vehicle manufacturing facilities by 2028. The first model being manufactured at the new production line will be its compact SUV model Brezza. “Suzuki could retain its lead in India’s passenger-car market backed by added capacity and a robust product pipeline for the growing SUV segment”, Bloomberg Intelligence analysts Tatsuo Yoshida and Marie-Christine Yoko Huss wrote in a note on Wednesday. The company is targeting “sales of 2.54 million units by fiscal 2031 and a 50% market share, but rival product offensives remain a challenge”, they wrote. +++
+++ MERCEDES-BENZ signalled plans to add production of a core model in 2027 to its 30-year-old assembly operations in Vance, Alabama. Mercedes did not disclose the nameplate, but AutoForecast Solutions predicts Mercedes will build the GLC at the plant near Tuscaloosa. “Adding production in the U.S. just makes sense”, Sam Fiorani, vice president at AutoForecast Solutions, said. “Not only does it fill the plant, but it gets the company around the costly tariffs associated with imports from the EU”. Speaking of the GLC, Mercedes plans to unveil a new full-electric GLC at the Munich auto show in September. The GLC will replace the full-electric EQC, which Mercedes stopped making last year. +++
+++ NISSAN has decided to withdraw from automobile production at its Wuhan plant in China’s Hubei Province by the end of fiscal 2025, according to sources. Though the plant in mainland China is a major manufacturing base capable of an annual production capacity of 300.000 units, its operating rate had declined to less than 10% of capacity due to sluggish sales resulting from the rise of Chinese automakers. Nissan is forecasted to fall into its worst ever deficit and is speeding up its restructuring measures. The Wuhan plant will close after only about 3 years of operation since it opened in 2022. The plant manufactured Nissan’s strategic global cars, such as the Ariya and the X-Trail. But the plant’s annual output of these cars had been around 10.000 units in 2022 and 2023, the sources said. Since 2024, the plant has manufactured EVs for Nissan’s Chinese joint venture partner, Dongfeng Motor, to raise the operating rate. Nissan’s net profit forecast for the fiscal year ending March 2025 is predicted to be a ¥750 billion deficit, the worst ever for the company. Nissan’s sales volume in China was down 12% in 2024 from the previous year at a sluggish 700.000 units, which was half of sales in 2018 before the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. Though Nissan plans to export 100.000 cars manufactured in China per year to offset the fall in sales, it is possible that high tariffs imposed by the United States and Europe may increase uncertainty about the plan. Nissan also ceased production at another Chinese plant in Changzhou, Jiangsu Province, in June 2024. The number of Nissan’s production bases in China will be down to 4 following the planned closure of the Wuhan plant. In February this year, Nissan announced it was reducing its production capacity in China from 1.5 million units to 1 million. But the current capacity will still be excessive. “We will consider the additional closure of plants”, said a senior official of Nissan. +++
+++ Pedestrians hit by SUVs and pick-ups are significantly more likely to be killed than those hit by lower-riding hatchbacks and saloons, according to a new study. Conducted by Imperial College London and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, the review compared data from collisions involving SUVs and ‘light trucks’ (pick-ups and small vans) with those involving saloons and hatchbacks. Its analysis of 682.509 collisions found that the risk of an adult pedestrian dying in a collision is 44% higher when they are hit by an SUV or light truck compared with a regular passenger car. For a child aged 0-9, that risk increases to 130% higher. The study estimates that 17% of adult pedestrian and cyclist fatalities could be avoided if drivers swapped their SUVs for lower-riding cars instead. That translates to 620 lives per year, it said. However, it should be noted that the study primarily focuses on collisions in the United States where vehicles are typically larger and heavier than in Europe. Four-fifths of the study’s comparisons between crashes involving SUVs and regular passenger cars were from America. European data is also influenced by the lower proportion of SUVs driven, compared with the United States. As such, the study estimates that 8% of adult pedestrian and cyclist fatalities in Europe could be avoided by switching to traditional passenger cars. Despite the findings, the report cautions against a blanket ban on ‘SUVs’, noting there is no universally accepted or legal definition of what constitutes an SUV. It instead urges action against the biggest risk factor: the high beltlines and blunt front ends that are typical of SUVs and pick-ups. “The key mechanism underlying this increased risk appears to be the taller and blunter profile of the front end of SUVs and light trucks”, the study states. “This means that the victim is initially struck higher up on their body (eg, the pelvis not the legs for an adult, or the thorax not the pelvis for a child). It further means that the victim is more likely to be thrown forward into the road, rather than carried on the vehicle’s bonnet. These and other crash dynamics are associated with a higher proportion of upper body injuries (including to the head, thorax and abdomen) and with a more serious injury profile”. Indeed, according to a study published in journal Economics of Transportation, a 10 cm increase in a car’s front-end height increases the risk of pedestrian fatality by 22%. +++
+++ This year will see the launch of a new TOYOTA RAV4 , heralding a fresh take on one of the world’s best-selling new cars. This 6th iteration will be bigger, boxier and more technologically advanced, with a chunky design offering even greater appeal for its millions of customers while still keeping the Toyota family look from models such as the current Prius and C-HR. However, while the car is all-new in look and feel, under the skin we expect it to be closely related to the outgoing model by using the firm’s flexible TNGA architecture. In TNGA-K form, it’s being widely deployed across a variety of mid-sized Toyotas, such as the Camry saloon and Highlander, as well as most of the Lexus range including the NX, RX, ES saloon and the LM (a MPV). The new RAV4 will be a vital model for Toyota, having been a strong seller since the original model debuted in 1994. The fifth-generation RAV4 was the third-best selling car globally in 2024 at over 1 million units, close behind the Tesla Model 3 and Toyota Corolla. The 6th-generation RAV4 has been spotted testing in the United States. The prototype’s body looked taller and boxier than on the current version. Styling elements will include a slim set of C-shaped LED lights similar as those seen in other Toyota models, paired to a large lower grille and bluff bonnet. The body-side retains its faceted wheel arches with plastic surrounds and a split C-pillar which will allow the new car to be specified with a contrasting roof colour. The rear end looks upright and boxy which should be good for visibility and interior space, with a wide and deep tailgate opening helping keep the load lip as low as possible. The new RAV4 isn’t likely to send the world into hyperdrive on design alone (it’s just too important a model in terms of sheer market share) but the elements that have kept it popular over the decades will no doubt remain. In profile, the RAV4 will retain its distinctive, squared off arches with plastic surrounds, while split C-pillars will allow the car to be specified with a contrasting roof colour. But don’t expect a sloping roofline or aggressive wide shoulders, as we have seen on other coupé-inspired SUVs, because this will be very much a model focused on practicality, as buyers have come to expect. As is currently the case in Europe, a range-topping GR Sport trim will be offered featuring sporty design elements such as larger wheels and unique badging. Other elements from the current model, such as dual-colour paintwork and motorsport-inspired mesh grille inserts, will also be part of the package. Inside, we expect the RAV4 to get a complete overhaul, with larger digital interfaces paired with a decent number of physical controls. While the RAV4 is technically unrelated to the much larger Toyota Land Cruiser, we suspect the SUV’s design and layout will be inspired by the flagship off-roader. This includes the use of a larger touchscreen, plus the adoption of a fully digital instrument cluster, plus tougher interior plastics and seat trim. Given the likely underpinnings, we have a good sense of the sort of powertrains that Toyota will offer in the new RAV4, with Dutch models likely to share a 2.5-litre naturally aspirated 4-cylinder petrol engine and a CVT gearbox with plug-in hybrid assistance, linked to a clever i-AWD system that adds an electric motor to the rear axle, improving traction without the need to fit a drag-inducing propellor shaft. Since Lexus has introduced an all-electric variant of its new ES, it’s thought the RAV4 will adopt this architecture. Toyota’s work with hydrogen fuel-cells is likely to be a step too far for the new RAV4, despite the brand working on more space-efficient packaging. Hydrogen is very much part of the company’s future powertrain strategy, and there could be a chance of a derivative employing the tech at a later date, but it can’t happen without major modifications to the platform, and as such is off the table for mass production. Toyota isn’t likely to offer a 7-seat version of the new RAV4, either, because it has other models to fill that niche depending on the market. In Europe, the Land Cruiser offers this, as did the more road-biased Highlander for a short while. However, this US- focused model didn’t gel with buyers on this side of the Atlantic. As a critical model in Toyota’s global line-up, the RAV4 is a big contributor to the company’s overall profitability. Last year, it sold almost 800.000 of them in the US alone. It was also the world’s highest selling Toyota in both 2021 and 2022, and not far off the top-spot in ’23 and ‘24 either. A big chunk of global sales go to North America and RAV4s for that market are built in Kentucky and Canadian plants. Although the RAV4 is a global model, development of the latest version has been heavily influenced by the demands of the US and Canada. This may mean that European models come later, so while we’ll see the RAV4 this year, we’ll have to wait a little longer to drive it. +++
+++ The VOLKSWAGEN GROUP ’s earnings after tax plummeted 40.6 percent to €2.18 billion in the first quarter of 2025. At first glance, you might assume this sharp decline was due to a drop in sales. But that’s not the case. Deliveries actually rose by 1.4 percent to 2.13 million units. So what’s going on? Ironically, the growing demand for electric vehicles is weighing on the company’s bottom line. EV sales more than doubled in Europe in the first quarter of 2025 (+113 percent) and jumped by 51 percent in the United States. 10 percent of the vehicles delivered worldwide by the Group through March was electric. In addition, the order backlog in Western Europe for electric cars during the first three months jumped by 64 percent. EVs now account for over 20 percent of all orders in Western Europe. Across the entire continent, VW is the leader in the electric segment by having a 26 percent share. But this shift toward lower-margin EVs dragged the operating margin down from 6 percent to just 3.7 percent. Arno Antlitz, Volkswagen Group’s CFO and COO, acknowledged that the company’s strong performance in electric cars highlights a harsh reality: EVs are still significantly less profitable than combustion vehicles. He admitted the automaker must work hard to cut production costs and boost margins on zero-emission models. “This market success of our electric cars puts pressure on our result. An operating margin of around four percent clearly shows that there is still a considerable amount of work ahead of us. Given the current volatile global economic situation, it is even more important to focus on the levers within our control. This means complementing our great product range with a competitive cost base, so we can ensure to succeed also in rapidly changing global markets”. Back in 2023, Antlitz predicted that margin parity between ICE and EVs could be reached as soon as 2025. The new target is now 2026, with the launch of the ID.2 supermini and a crossover derivative expected to match the profitability of the T-Cross. Beyond those two VW models, Cupra and Skoda will each launch their own versions, all targeting the €25.000 segment. A cheaper ID.1 is also on the way for 2027, priced at €20.000. In case you’re wondering which VW Group EVs were the most popular in the first quarter of 2025, here’s the top 10: 1) Volkswagen ID.4/ID.5: 43.700, 2) Volkswagen ID.3: 28.100, 3) Audi Q4 e-Tron/Q4 e-Tron Sportback: 22.800,
4) Skoda Enyaq/Enyaq Coupé: 20.200 5) Volkswagen ID.7/ID.7 Tourer: 19.100 6) Audi Q6 e-Tron/Q6 e-Tron Sportback: 16.000 7) Porsche Macan: 14.200 8) Volkswagen ID.Buzz/Cargo: 12.700 9) Cupra Born: 11.000 and 10) Cupra Tavascan: 7.600. It’s worth noting that EV profitability isn’t the only factor impacting the Group’s financial health. Volkswagen continues to absorb costs tied to ongoing Dieselgate litigation and expenses related to increasingly strict CO₂ regulations in the European Union. +++