Greetings from London!

If you work in supply chain management in the auto industry, you might be experiencing déjà vu. Again.

All of a sudden, not only are more of Donald Trump’s tariffs back on the table – this time for medium and heavy duty trucks – but the risk of widespread or wholescale production disruption is back.

Whether it’s rare earths or chips, supply chain headaches are multiplying and global car executives are no doubt wondering if they could have just one lousy quarter without someone or something threatening to shut them down.

Which brings us to today’s Auto File…

There has been a fairly steady drumbeat of bad news out of Porsche this year, from weak sales in China to U.S. tariffs and an embarrassing fall from Germany’s blue chip index last month.

Porsche stock has lost more than half its value since its IPO three years ago, making Oliver Blume’s unpopular dual role as Porsche CEO and CEO of parent company Volkswagen increasingly untenable.

Facing a series of urgent problems, Porsche has lined up ex-McLaren boss Michael Leiters to take over as chief executive. But not until January 1. What until recently was a plum role at a high-margin business in the car industry is now seen as more of a “poisoned chalice,” a restructuring job that will likely involve fresh job cuts and getting the company’s sales back on track.

Meanwhile, in a couple of months Blume will start running Volkswagen full time – in a vote of confidence, the automaker extended his contract for five years until the end of 2030.

Volkswagen is arguably an automaker in need of a full-time CEO. In particular in China, where after years as the country’s No. 1 automaker it was overtaken by local rival BYD in 2024. At its current rate of growth, China's Geely appears set to knock Volkswagen into third place in 2025.

No wonder investors have been unhappy.

Nexperia, automakers' newest headache - REUTERS/Fabian Bimmer.

The Chinese government’s decision earlier this month to expand export controls on rare earth materials came just six months after earlier curbs – in both cases as part of an on-again-off-again trade war with the Trump administration.

This has left the auto industry scrambling for rare earth supplies once more. That is easier said than done. Auto suppliers depleted their stocks of rare earths during the last set of export controls and China – which dominates mining and controls almost all processing – has slowed the flow of rare earth materials to the point that no one has been able to replenish stockpiles.

That leaves the industry hoping that the U.S. and China will strike a trade deal before the export controls take effect on November 8.

If that were not enough, an intellectual property dispute over chipmaker Nexperia between China and the Dutch government threatens to halt production of some car models.

It has only been a couple of years since the end of the semiconductor chip crisis, which forced automakers to halt the production of millions of cars.

The threat of more Nexperia-related stoppages is another supply chain headache the auto industry really doesn’t need right now.

The first trillion is the hardest - Patrick Pleul/Pool via REUTERS 

Tesla’s proposed $1 trillion pay package has not gone down well with proxy advisors ISS or Glass Lewis, both of which recommend that shareholders vote against a payout almost as big as the economy of Turkey (population approximately 90 million). 

Musk's record Tesla pay plan could still hand him tens of billions of dollars even if he fails to hit some targets, thanks to a structure that rewards partial achievement and soaring share prices.

Glass Lewis said the potential decrease in Tesla shareholder value and details of the proposed payment terms "warrant significant concern," while ISS said it "reduces the board's ability to meaningfully adjust future pay levels."

But it is hard to see Tesla’s small mom-and-pop shareholders, many of whom are avid fans of Musk, paying much attention to proxy advisors. They voted overwhelmingly for his $56 billion pay package last year after a Delaware court had voided it.

Back in 2022 when Renault and Geely said they were carving out their combustion engine operations into a unit called Horse, it seemed an apt name for a technology that was doomed to follow the motor car’s predecessor in short order. A world of electric vehicles was just around the corner, after all.

But Horse today looks like less of a repository for dying assets and more of a potential opportunity for expansion. The Trump administration has been anything but friendly to EVs and the electric transition in Europe has been slower than expected.

So, Horse’s bet is that it can sell engines for gasoline-powered cars and hybrids of different varieties for years to come to automakers that cannot afford to develop everything themselves, and become the world’s No. 1 engine maker within a decade.

Auto industry experts say it’s good timing for Horse, though skeptics argue that betting on old technology could easily backfire on the company.

Stellantis announced a $13 billion investment in the U.S. to bring five new models to market and add 5,000 jobs in plants across the Midwest over the next four years.

Global investors called on Toyota to provide more disclosure about its planned buyout of group firm Toyota Industries, criticising what they said was an "opaque" valuation and a failure to safeguard the interests of minority shareholders.

Stellantis and Chinese autonomous driving firm Pony.ai have signed an agreement to jointly develop and test self-driving vehicles in Europe.

Europe should pay at least as much attention to self-driving cars as it does to EVs if it wants to play a role in one of the key technologies of the next decade, the CEO of Estonian ride-hailing and food delivery company Bolt said.

Foxconn's two-year pursuit of a stake in a unit of German auto supplier