The Japanese car giant Honda announced Tuesday that he planned a collapse of 70% of his net profits in 2025-2026, due in particular to the impact of American customs surcharge and, despite his high production in the United States. In the year began in early April, Honda, the second Japanese manufacturer, anticipates a net gain of 250 billion yen (1.53 billion euros).
The net impact of prohibitive customs tasks in the Trump administration should reduce its annual operational gain by 450 billion yen (or 2.74 billion euros), anticipates the group. “The impact of customs policies in several countries has been very important, and are reviewed regularly, which hinders the development of forecasts,” said Toshihiro Mibe.
The Honda forecasts were examined after their rival Toyota, the world number one in the sector, announced that it anticipated a 35% diving of net earnings in 2025-26, especially due to the Washington customs offensive. The administration of US President Donald Trump has imposed 25% surcharges since the beginning of April in imported cars to the United States, but also imports of spare parts.
Imports in the United States
Honda is certainly more saved than its competitors, due to its high production on the site: it produced a little more than one million cars in its 12 American factories during the year 2024. or more than 60% of the vehicles it sells in the United States, the highest percentage of Japanese manufacturers, Tatsuo Yoshida, Bloomberg intelligence analyst.
In addition, Washington recently softened the surcharge for the importation of spare parts for vehicles gathered on American soil. The impact of taxes will be “relatively lower for Honda,” says Tatsuo Yoshida. On the other hand, Honda will be affected in imported vehicles to the United States, including its flagship model, the SUV CR-V, manufactured in Canada.
In the immediate future, Honda, however, experienced in March an increase of 13.2% for a year of its sales in the United States, with almost 1,47,800 vehicles, thanks to consumers who specify their purchase before the cleaner of customs surcharges was announced. For last year 2024-25, completed at the end of March, Honda has already registered a 24.5% drop in net profit, 835 billion yen, for an increased billing by 6.2%, to 21,689 billion yen (132 billion euros).
“Our automotive activity has suffered a fall in sales volumes, mainly in China and the Southeast Asia region,” said Toshihiro Mibe.
Like its Japanese compatriots and Western manufacturers, Honda suffers in China, a crucial market where it obtains about 30% of its sales in volume, of the fierce competition of Chinese brands, particularly at the point of electricity. Honda was also negatively affected by the increase in incentives for the sale of electric vehicles in North America, “a niche where the Japanese group remains too late, which has not compensated” the increase in sales of hybrid vehicles, “said Toshihiro Mibe.
100% electric for 2040
The group has established the ambitious objective of becoming 100% electric in its automotive segment by 2021 on horizon 2040. To achieve this, Honda announced in the spring of 2024 wanting to change at a higher speed with an investment of almost 60 billion euros by 2030, twice what it intended to spend so far.
However, Honda announced on Tuesday that he had postponed his project to establish a supply chain for the production of electric vehicles in Canada in two years, due to a fall in demand, less vigorous than expected. The previously announced plan included a battery factory and an electric vehicle plant with an annual production capacity of 240,000 vehicles. “The growth of the electric vehicle market has slowed more than expected initially, which makes it difficult to anticipate new progress,” said Toshihiro Mibe.
Honda had also opened at the end of 2024 with his compatriot in Nissan difficulty, in mass debt, for a marriage that could give birth to the third world manufacturer and allow to face the crucial turn of electric cars together. But Honda and Nissan finished discussions in mid -February: Honda, in a situation of strength, wanted to transform Nissan into a simple subsidiary, which the latter fiercely rejected.
Source: BFM TV
