AFP|Published
Mercedes-Benz on Tuesday became the third big German carmaker to cut its outlook for the year on tough conditions in China, underlining the scale of the crisis facing the industry.
Citing difficulties in China – the world's largest car market – as well as higher material costs, core profit for 2026 is now expected to be on a par with the prior year's 5.8 billion euros (R108 billion), the company said. It had previously foreseen an increase of at least 15 percent.
Profit margins at the core car business are now indicated at between two and three percent for the year, Mercedes-Benz said, down from the three to five percent previously.
Mercedes-Benz shares fell 4.2 percent after the cut. Volkswagen and BMW were both down a little over two percent.
BMW and Volkswagen have both already cut their guidance for the year as sluggish demand combined with cut-throat competition from Chinese local rivals such as BYD and Xiaomi have eaten into profits.
Mercedes-Benz's vehicle deliveries in China – last year already at their lowest level since 2016 – fell a further 29 percent in the nine months to end-September.
Being partially muscled out of China has led to painful adjustments for Germany's car industry, one of the country's largest employers.
Mercedes-Benz CEO Ola Kaellenius has urged German workers to work extra hours without pay at the same time as expanding the company's manufacturing footprint in Hungary, where he says costs are about 70 percent lower than in Germany.
Volkswagen plans to have cut 120,000 jobs globally by the end of the decade in what is the largest restructuring in automotive history, eclipsing the 50,000 jobs lost after the bankruptcy of General Motors in 2009.
Core profit for the third quarter came in at 1.77 billion euros, Mercedes-Benz said in preliminary results, and the profit margin at the cars business was 2.5 percent.
The company reports full third-quarter results on Wednesday.
AFP
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