American flags flutter outside a Hyundai automobile dealership in Irvine, California, U.S., March 27, 2025.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Mike Blake | Reuters<\/p>\n
DETROIT \u2014 Hyundai Motor and General Motors<\/a> are set to be two of the greatest beneficiaries of lower U.S. tariffs on imports, including vehicles, from South Korea.<\/p>\n The South Korean-based automaker is the largest U.S. importer<\/a> of new vehicles from the country, followed by GM. Both automakers have paid billions of dollars in levies so far this year after President Donald Trump<\/a> placed 25% tariffs<\/a> on imported vehicles from South Korea and other countries in the spring. <\/p>\n The Trump administration this past week confirmed plans to lower tariffs on certain products, including vehicles, to 15% from South Korea. A notice about the implementation of the trade deal<\/a> was posted Wednesday on the Federal Register. Other countries such as Japan and the United Kingdom also have negotiated lower tariff rates with the Trump administration.<\/p>\n Prior to the reduction, Hyundai reported U.S. tariffs costed the company 1.8 trillion won ($1.2 billion) in the third quarter, up from 828 billion won ($565 million) in the previous quarter. GM most recently said its tariff impacts<\/a>, largely from South Korea and Mexico, were expected to be between $3.5 billion and $4.5 billion in 2025.<\/p>\n GM CFO Paul Jacobson said Wednesday that the automaker initially expected tariffs on South Korean imports to cost $2 billion but that the company has been able to offset many of those costs. He said GM expects the levies to cost closer to $1 billion or less in 2026.<\/p>\n “We do think that is going to be a tailwind next year, just not as much as the whole 50% because the ultimate tariff bill that we’re going to pay this year for\u00a0Korea\u00a0was going to be a lot lower than the $2 billion from the stuff that we’ve been working on,” Jacobson said during a UBS conference.<\/p>\n The U.S. tariff announcement comes after South Korea officially introduced legislation<\/a> in its parliament aiming to fulfill its promise to invest $350 billion for the U.S. over several years.<\/p>\n Hyundai Motor Group Executive Chair Euisun Chung delivers remarks, as U.S. President Donald Trump, U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and Governor of Louisiana Jeff Landry stand, in the Roosevelt Room at the White House, in Washington, D.C., U.S., March 24, 2025.\u00a0<\/p>\n Carlos Barria | Reuters<\/p>\n “Korea’s commitment to American investment strengthens our economic partnership and domestic jobs and industry.\u00a0We are also grateful for the deep trust between our two nations,” U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick<\/a> said in a statement posted Monday on X.<\/p>\n Hyundai North America CEO Randy Parker said the tariffs are still challenging but better than 25% as the automaker aims for a sixth-consecutive year of record U.S. retail sales in 2026. <\/p>\n “Fifteen percent is still 15%,” he told CNBC during a phone interview Tuesday. “Getting to 15% is a great milestone. It’s been quite the journey reaching this agreement, which has been, I would say, quite extensive.”<\/p>\n Hyundai, including its Kia subsidiary that operates separately in the U.S., has significantly increased its sales and operations<\/a> in the U.S. in recent years. But the automaker continues to import the majority of its vehicles \u2014 estimated to be nearly 1 million units this year \u2014 from South Korea.<\/p>\n GlobalData estimates more than 1.37 million vehicles, or about 8.6% of the U.S. sales this year, will be vehicles that were imported from South Korea \u2014 making the country the largest exporter of American-sold vehicles aside from Mexico.<\/p>\n Hyundai is expected to import more than 951,000 vehicles in 2026, according to GlobalData. That includes more than 369,000 for Kia and 582,000 for Hyundai and its luxury Genesis brand.<\/p>\n Hyundai aims to have more than 80% of its U.S. vehicle sales be produced locally by 2030, the company said this year. That compares with roughly 40% currently.\u00a0<\/p>\n Despite the tariffs, GM is estimated to import nearly 422,000 vehicles from South Korea this year to the U.S., according to GlobalData. That would be a 3.6% increase compared with record imports of more than 407,000 units last year.<\/p>\n GM has increasingly used South Korean plants to produce popular entry-level crossovers for Chevrolet and Buick. Its U.S. sales of South Korean-produced vehicles \u2014 largely entry-level models \u2014 have risen from 173,000 in 2019 to more than 407,000 last year, according to GlobalData.<\/p>\n GM, in an emailed statement, said the company “appreciates that negotiators have finalized an agreement on trade between the US and South Korea.”<\/p>\n “GM’s long-standing Korea operations produce high-quality, affordable crossovers that complement our U.S. vehicles and domestic production, which will soon rise to 2 million units. We will be monitoring and reviewing the details,” GM said.<\/p>\n GM produces its Buick Encore GX and Buick Envista<\/a> crossovers, as well as the Chevrolet Trailblazer and Chevrolet Trax crossovers, at plants in South Korea. The company has touted the vehicles as being a pinnacle for the automaker’s profitable growth in lower-margin, entry-level vehicles.<\/p>\n Detainees are made to stand against a bus before being handcuffed, during a raid by federal agents where about 300 South Koreans were among 475 people arrested at the site of a $4.3 billion project by Hyundai Motor and LG Energy Solution to build batteries for electric cars in Ellabell, Georgia, U.S. September 4, 2025 in a still image taken from a video. <\/p>\n U.s. Immigration And Customs Enf | Via Reuters<\/p>\n The new U.S.-South Korea trade deal comes months after<\/a> a period of tension between the two countries following an immigration raid<\/a>\u00a0at a battery plant jointly owned by Hyundai and LG Energy Solution in Georgia.<\/p>\n About 475 workers, including more than 300 South Koreans, were arrested in the Sept. 4 raid at the plant in Ellabell, Georgia, according to U.S. immigration officials.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"American flags flutter outside a Hyundai automobile dealership in Irvine, California, U.S., March 27, 2025.\u00a0 Mike Blake |…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":422839,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[6147,9167,76,64,81,77,69,9233,17785,80,15243,522,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-422838","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-autos","9":"tag-breaking-news-business","10":"tag-breaking-news-politics","11":"tag-business","12":"tag-business-news","13":"tag-donald-j-trump","14":"tag-donald-trump","15":"tag-general-motors-co","16":"tag-howard-lutnick","17":"tag-politics","18":"tag-south-korea","19":"tag-transportation","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-unitedstates","22":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115658226677969199","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422838","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=422838"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422838\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/422839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=422838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=422838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=422838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}