According to the Global Times, The Paper and other media reports, the Biden administration will retain the tariff policy implemented by the previous administration and impose tariffs on other Chinese goods. Among them, the tariffs on electric vehicles in China will be increased from the current 25% to 100%.
Many people believe that before the tariffs were raised, there were many obstacles and huge risks for Chinese cars to enter the US market, and the North American market was not really opened, and even if the tariffs were imposed by 200%, they would not have any substantive effect. In fact, the mainland exports hundreds of thousands of new cars to the United States every year, but the stick of tariffs may not really fall on these car companies.
Specifically, about 400,000 cars are sold to the United States every year, which is not a small amount, worth tens of billions of dollars. So, which car companies are "secretly" exporting?
First of all, Changan Ford, a subsidiary of the group (Changan holds 40% of the shares, Ford holds 60%), has been selling back to the United States since 2019. For example, the Focus has a small share in China, but it is very popular in the American market, and most of the domestic Focus production capacity is sold to the United States. Currently, Changan Ford exports about 100,000 new vehicles to the U.S. every year.
The car company that exports the most to the United States should be SAIC, although SAIC Motor has not disclosed relevant data, but we can make an estimate. In 2023, SAIC will export a total of 1.208 million new cars, of which MG's total sales are 840,000 units, in addition to about 100,000 domestic sales, the number of exports overseas should be more than 700,000 units, Wuling's export volume last year was more than 110,000 units, and SAIC Maxus was 96,000 units, with a total of more than 900,000 units.
The main force of SAIC's own brand exports is MG, Maxus and Wuling, and the rest of the independent brand passenger cars and new energy brands are basically piecemeal, so where does the remaining nearly 300,000 exports come from?
SAIC-GM has been selling back to the U.S. since 2016, and it is estimated that about 200,000 new cars will be exported to the U.S. every year (SAIC Volkswagen's exports are very small).
Another brand that exports heavily to the United States is Volvo, which owns nearly 80 percent of Volvo even after its listing, making it reasonable to say that it is a Chinese automaker. Volvo began to sell in the United States as early as the 50s of the last century, and its market popularity and reputation are very good, with a total sales of more than 110,000 units in the American market last year.
It can be seen that the total export of Changan Ford, SAIC-GM and Volvo to the United States exceeded 400,000 units, but the additional tariffs did not fall on them. The focus of the tariffs is on electric vehicles, and most of the cars sold to the U.S. are gasoline-powered vehicles. It is estimated that the United States took this into account when designing the tariffs, and it can't break off the business of its own Ford and GM, right?
Even with the tariffs, the more than 400,000 cars produced in China will still be sold to Americans as usual, with little to no impact. Xiaobian personally believes that if other domestic fuel vehicles are to be exported to the United States, the key is that there is no advantage of the above brands, the investment and risk are high, and the benefits are limited.
If you have to ask which electric vehicles are exported to the United States, the answer can only be the domestic electric "three jumpers", which are said to be popular in the suburbs and farms of the United States.