Tesla CEO Elon Musk was busy on Twitter overnight. “Give people their freedom back!” he tweeted ahead of Tesla releasing first-quarter results Wednesday. “Elon Musk: FREE AMERICA NOW,” he wrote in another post.
The supplier said it's bracing itself for a worldwide recession as the coronavirus pandemic has halted factory output and sapped consumer demand.
CEO Hakan Samuelsson said customers will not want the same products as before the pandemic so the automaker needs to step up its shift to new products and business models.
The automaker reiterated it expects group revenue and earnings before interest and taxes to be below 2019 levels, but the Mercedes cars and vans division should deliver higher earnings this year because of substantial one-off charges in the prior year.
The German automaker said it expects operating profit for 2020 to be severely below last year, but still to remain positive. Its first-quarter profit fell 81 percent to 900 million euros ($975 million), in line with preliminary numbers released this month.
Luc Donckerwolke, the cosmopolitan Belgian designer who overhauled the styling at Hyundai, Kia and Genesis, is leaving the Hyundai Motor Group for personal reasons.
