Ford CEO urges Trump to avoid 'cherry' tariffs as auto industry faces billions of dollars threat
Ford (F) CEO Jim Farley rang out in President Trump's tariff plan, but not many expected.
During Ford's fourth-quarter revenue call yesterday, Farley warned that extended tariffs were imposed from imports from Mexico and Canada, and that Ford and rival General Motors (GM) manufacturing vehicles would have a “destructive impact” on the industry. , and potentially earn billions of dollars in profits to be wiped out.
However, he picked out other automakers who imported cars from outside the United States and did not assume any levy, claiming that the current tariff plans targeting specific countries are unfair.
“What makes no sense to me is why we have a conversation at Hyundai-kia (Korea) is that there is no incremental tariff import of 600,000 units to the United States, and that Toyota (Japan) is able to import half of the Millions of cars with increasing tariffs enter the United States?” Farley said. “I mean, there are millions of vehicles entering our country and these vehicles are not applied to these, so if we are going to have tariff policies … it’s better to have a comprehensive and comprehensive industry.”
Farley added: “We can’t just pick one place or another because it’s a liar for our import competitors.”
Read more: What are tariffs and how do they affect you?
While Toyota (TM) does not pay any incremental tariffs on vehicles imported from Japan, it does currently pay a small percentage of 2.5%. Given the import war in the 1980s, the import war of Japanese cars, the tariffs on Japanese vehicles were interesting when the tariffs on Japanese cars exceeded 60% in some cases.
As for Hyundai and sister company Kia, 67% of its U.S. sales are made in South Korea, with the rest coming from parliamentary factories in the U.S. and Mexico. Last year, the two sold a total of 1.7 million cars in the United States.
The United States has currently reached a free trade agreement with South Korea, which means that imported light vehicles such as passenger cars are not subject to tariffs.
Given his priorities, Farley's focus on tariffs (and, of course, to ensure competitors face the same difficulties) may not matter to Trump.
“Trump is not focused on Japan,” wrote in the Japan Times. “So, Japan is much better in position than many other countries.”
Even if the trade war passes with Canada and Mexico, Farley believes Ford is better than other competitors because it is the most central automaker (with the largest UAW workforce) and built its Cash-Cow F-series trucks in the United States .