Chinese Car Giants Rush Into Brazil With Dreams of Dominating a Continent
Its goal is to reinvent the way Brazil drives, and ultimately, the rest of Latin America, much as Chinese automakers have already done across much of Asia and want to do in Europe.
Until recently, this factory was run by Mercedes-Benz, the German giant of 20th century automotive innovation that churned out cars powered by gasoline. Today, it's owned by Great Wall Motor, a company that decades ago made rugged pickup trucks for the Chinese countryside but is now one of China's leading exporters of stylish, affordable electric cars.
The change in hands reflects a profound disruption for one of the world's most vital industries. If American and European gas-guzzling cars once dominated global tastes and trends, that era appears to be fast turning to China's favor.
Today, not only does China make and export more cars of all types than any other country in the world, Chinese firms dominate the global manufacture of battery-powered vehicles of the future. They also control the supply chain for virtually everything that goes into those cars.
Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
14 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Chinese automakers gain ground in contracting European market, data shows
By Amir Orusov (Reuters) -Car registrations across Europe declined in June, with a 4.4% year-on-year drop to 1.25 million vehicles, data from Jato Dynamics showed on Wednesday. While overall demand softened, Chinese automakers continued to gain ground, taking a record market share and squeezing several established European brands, the research data showed. WHY IT'S IMPORTANT Chinese automakers are expanding in Europe, breaking into a market traditionally dominated by European and American brands supported by their cheaper pricing amid a shift towards electric vehicles. This has stoked trade tensions between Brussels and Beijing, including a row over EU tariffs on Chinese-made EVs, imposed to protect European producers. BY THE NUMBERS Chinese brands nearly doubled their combined share of the European market to 5.1% in the first half of 2025, just shy of Mercedes-Benz's 5.2%, the report said. Registrations of Chinese vehicles surged 91% since the start of the year. BYD, Jaecoo, Omoda, Leapmotor and Xpeng were the five names fuelling the surge, with BYD alone registering 70,500 units in the first six months of 2025, a 311% jump from a year ago. Stellantis saw the steepest market share decline among major automakers, to 15.3% from 16.7% a year earlier. The second biggest decline came from Tesla, to 1.6% in the half-year period versus 2.4% last year. Registrations of battery electric vehicles (BEV) surpassed one million for the first time in the first half, with a 25% rise to 1.19 million units — 17.4% of the market. KEY QUOTES "Persistently high prices, geopolitical and economic tensions with Europe's trading partners, and the postpandemic market reality are behind the decline," Felipe Munoz, global analyst at JATO Dynamics, said. "The updated Tesla Model Y has so far failed to provide the expected sales boost for the brand," Munoz said. "At the same time, competition from BYD and Volkswagen Group is making it harder for Tesla to maintain its leadership position."
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
ADM to close Brazil pet-food plant amid cost-cutting
ADM is to shut manufacturing plant in Brazil, marking the end of its production of pet food in the country. The US agri-food giant is closing its site in Três Corações in the eastern state of Minas Gerais. The facility supplies branded pet-food products as well as livestock and aqua feed. "We will no longer have dedicated pet manufacturing facilities in Brazil. Our pet business in other countries and regions will continue," the company said in a statement. "ADM is always assessing its portfolio as we focus globally on strategic simplification to ensure we're operating the right assets to meet customer needs, achieve our returns objectives, and be the most effective operator of each part of the business. "After exploring a wide variety of alternatives, we've determined that our Três Corações facility and related businesses and assets no longer align with our future operational needs." Around 750 staff work at the facility, who, along with around 150 employees at other, undisclosed locations, will be affected by the closure, ADM confirmed. In February, ADM outlined plans to save $500-700m over the next five years through lower manufacturing costs, cuts in purchased materials and job losses. The company pointed to "ongoing market challenges, including global legislative and regulatory policy uncertainty". In 2024, ADM generated $85.5bn in revenue, an 8.9% decrease from 2023. Operating profit fell 28.8% to $4.2bn, and net profit decreased 47% to $1.8bn. In the first quarter of 2025, ADM reported $20.17bn in revenue, down 7.6% from Q1 2024. Net earnings attributable to ADM plunged 59.5% to $295m and total segment operating profit was $747m, down 38% versus the prior year quarter "ADM to close Brazil pet-food plant amid cost-cutting " was originally created and published by Just Food, a GlobalData owned brand. The information on this site has been included in good faith for general informational purposes only. It is not intended to amount to advice on which you should rely, and we give no representation, warranty or guarantee, whether express or implied as to its accuracy or completeness. You must obtain professional or specialist advice before taking, or refraining from, any action on the basis of the content on our site.
Fox News
2 hours ago
- Fox News
China controls over 80% of battery materials crucial to US defense equipment, unsettling report reveals
In a damning new report, researchers reveal how China came to control over 80% of the critical raw battery materials needed for defense technology — posing an urgent national security threat. Through lax permitting processes, weak environmental standards, and aggressive state-led interventions, China has come to dominate global supplies of graphite, cobalt, manganese, and the battery anode and cathode materials that power advanced defense systems. "Batteries will be one of the bullets of future wars," the report's authors warn, citing their essential role in drones, handheld radios, autonomous submersibles, and emerging capabilities like lasers and directed energy weapons. According to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has weaponized global battery infrastructure through a combination of state subsidies, forced intellectual property transfers, and predatory pricing practices. China didn't just rely on low-cost tactics — it also used its financial muscle abroad. Over the past two decades, at least 26 state-backed banks have pumped roughly $57 billion into mining and processing projects in Africa, Latin America, and beyond. These investments, often structured through joint ventures and special-purpose vehicles, gave Chinese firms controlling stakes in mineral mining, the report said. Through its Belt and Road Initiative, China has leveraged influence in resource-rich developing nations, securing control over massive critical mineral deposits. Today, it processes approximately 65% of the world's lithium, 85% of graphite, 70% of cathodes, 85% of anodes, and a staggering 97% of anode active materials. Beyond powering drones, handheld radios, and electric vehicles, lithium is critical in strategic military systems: lithium-ion batteries are used in grid support for bases and emerging directed-energy weapons. Moreover, Beijing has begun weaponizing export controls: since 2023, it has tightened restrictions on processed graphite, gallium, and germanium — later adding antimony, tungsten, and rare earths to the roster. These measures curb exports via a licensing regime and broad bans on exports to the U.S., signaling a clear geopolitical leverage too, according to the report. Both lithium and graphite are essential for modern nuclear weapons. Cobalt alloys are used in jet engines, naval turbines, electronics connectors, and sensors capable of withstanding extreme temperatures, vibration, and radiation-making. While American and allied reserves of lithium — both brine and hard rock — are being tapped, with new projects in North and South Carolina targeting domestic spodumene processing, the report claims U.S. mineral mining and refining are not advancing quickly enough to meet national security demands. Permitting obstacles account for roughly 40% of all delays in mining projects, the report notes, with processing operations facing similarly cumbersome constraints. Chinese subsidies "dwarf" those available to U.S. firms, and include tax exemptions, direct manufacturing grants, and ultra-low-interest loans, the report said. U.S. firms are now accelerating investment in domestic alternatives to China's lithium. With new Trump administration initiatives aimed at incentivizing critical mineral development—and forecasts projecting the U.S. lithium market to grow by roughly 500% over the next five years — American companies are beginning to build out processing capacity on home soil. Piedmont Lithium is developing a lithium hydroxide facility in North Carolina to process spodumene concentrate from its U.S. deposits, while Albemarle recently announced plans for a new lithium processing plant in Chester County, South Carolina. Both projects are designed to feed a fast-growing domestic battery ecosystem and reduce dependence on Chinese supply chains. But to become globally competitive, the report argues, the U.S. must take a far more proactive approach, including incentivizing private-sector investment, streamlining federal permitting, establishing a national critical minerals stockpile, building technical talent pipelines, creating special economic zones, and developing robust domestic processing infrastructure. The authors also stress the importance of ally-shoring, recommending diplomatic coordination with trusted partners — similar to prior U.S. efforts involving Ukraine, Greenland, and the DRC in rare-earth sourcing — to construct resilient supply chains beyond China's reach. "Despite China's control of the battery supply chain, this is a time of great vulnerability for Beijing, while the United States and its core allies remain strong," the report concludes. "It is time for new guardrails, muscular statecraft, and a unified international response to non-market manipulation. Building critical supply chains that are independent of China's coercive economic practices can help unleash a wave of cooperation among free-market nations that will lift up both established allies and emerging market partners and turn the tide against China's parasitic economic model."
