Featured 'Quite frustrating': B.C. man still waiting for EV ordered in 2020

Well... In a half-dozen years when we do a post-mortem on Toyota and why their stock tanked and they filed for bankruptcy protection, it's stories like these that will make it crystal clear where they went wrong.

Currently Short Interest (aka: profiting off the failure of a stock) is up to 837,351 Toyota shares according to: TM - Short Interest - Toyota Motor Corporation - ADR (NYSE) - Stock - Short Squeeze, Borrow Rates and has increased by 100K shares in the blink of an eye! And maybe that's not much with a company that has 1.3 billion stocks, but how fast are the short sell numbers gonna rise?

As in not only is Toyota failing to keep up with other automakers in EV production, but they're even falling behind with what was once their greatest strength in the hybrid car market.

I too have been contacted by people on Rav4 Prime waiting list who are desperate... I explained how a Nexcell Lithium upgrade pack on a used Rav4 hybrid is gonna get them alot closer to having a Rav4 Prime than any other option other than waiting for years/forever.

I mean if you're Tesla and you built your business on creating huge waiting lists, it wouldn't be a big deal because their growth at scale makes the wait not that bad. But when you're on a waiting list for three years from the #1 automaker, at least until May 2023 when Toyota's dominance ended for good: Tesla Model Y is the first EV to become the world’s bestselling car - The Verge it's time to gradually short sell as much Toyota stock as possible:

 

A couple weeks ago, I discovered new RAV4 Primes being allocated to Washington State dealerships for the very first time. Currently 1 in transit, and 10 in build phase, none marked as on the lots. Up until a month ago, I had only ever seen used units from out of state, with even higher markups than new units in Oregon.

At the same time, with Oregon's in-state incentives terminated for now, I'm seeing only 21 allocated to that state, mostly in build or transit, possibly a few sitting on the lots. Earlier this year, I was seeing 50 to 110 Oregon units showing on Toyota's public-facing inventory page.

 

This Jalopnik piece might address some of it.

"Car Dealers See EVs As A Threat To Their Immense Power And They're Getting Angry"

 

Fair enough, I am very angry with the lying dealers. My last cars were bought:

• Direct Tesla, Nashville delivery
• Ebay motors, Charlotte NC delivery
• Dealer internet sales, Rhode Island delivery
• Direct Toyota, Decatur delivery

Near as I can tell, dealers work hard to not get my business:

• Decatur dealer sold Prius Prime I had test driven before I could get back the next day. Then Southeast Toyota region embargoed further Prius Primes.
• Huntsville dealer could not sell the car we wanted after two visits. On the third visit, the sales manager made some calls to find the car in Florida, have it shipped, and aftermarket added the required cruise control.
• Decatur dealer offered a way too low trade-in value for the above car. Pissed, I complained about this with a coworker who was interested. He got the car for what the dealer offered rounded up a hundred dollars or so.
• Huntsville dealer left voice message for the Prius waiting list to trigger a "First person with $1,000 gets the Prius that arrived."
• Mandatory 20-30 minute delay for "management" approval and slow paper work that tries to sell additional warranty.

Bob Wilson

 

"You'll buy what WE want to sell you - & you'll like it"

This guy needs to do what we did when the Gen 2 was in very short supply - circa 2004. We bought used. Still won't be easy. Likely a whole lot of work, but at least the stealership doesn't get your money.
.

 

Toyota starts to feel like the Nokia of cars...
Dealers are starting to feel like the brick and mortar banks (I haven't gone to a bank location in a decade or more) for car sales and maintenance...

Things move on and some will be left behind. Hopefully for the better.

 

I can certainly understand the sense of desperation Toyota Stealerships must feel when all the their prospective customers have no interest in the inventory they have, only interest in plugins and EVs that have been falsely promised that they don't have. I bet they feel just as screwed over as all the people they've been screwing over for years. Kinda ironic really...

 

It is interesting that instead in Europe Toyota dealers have been pushing and selling hybrids for a decade now.

 

Higher gas prices help.

 

i thought they stopped selling prius in england?

dealers should love hybrids and phev's, twice the maintenance of a gasser

regarding the op, i still maintain phev is a compliance car and toyota loses money on every one manufactured

 

The Prius, yes, but there are other hybrids they sell there. The three Corollas, the Yaris, plus others. Dieselgate was a boon to Toyota hybrid sales.

What they would have to pay for batteries to make up for their shortfall, would result in them losing money. Instead, they just don't build any.

 

Lol, talking about the long ago past doesn't pay the bills... This comment sounds like Al Bundy of "Married With Children" forever talking about his glory days in High School football.

They'll lose way more money trying to sell people ICE and ICE-Hybrids no one wants to buy anymore... Every major automaker except Tesla is currently paying more than they make to get enough batteries to not lose market share while Toyota is bleeding out / gushing a massive loss of market share and telling everyone its just a scratch and it'll heal up on its own because no one wants EV even though we already hit the 100th monkey on EV demand being the primary demand for the passenger car that the majority want.

"The number of consumers looking to buy electric vehicles has hit 52%, according to the latest EY Mobility Consumer Index (MCI)." https://electrek.co/2022/05/27/52-percent-global-car-buyers-want-to-purchase-ev/

As in the newest Tesla in the Model Y has scaled up to international demand for it so rapidly that it kicked off Toyota Corrolla as the #1 selling car in the world: https://electrek.co/2023/06/01/tesla-model-y-outsells-2nd-place-id-4-by-4x-in-norway-97-electrified-in-may/

Toyota is doomed...

 

Who's talking about the past?

Many shifted to hybrids from diesels after the cheating scandal in Europe, and that buying pattern is still in effect. Neither the fact that the Prius had a high price because of import taxes, nor cancelling it, hinders Toyota hybrid sales as they offer other hybrid models there.

While plug in share is growing, there is still many people buying ICE and hybrids.

Europe is a different landscape. Car dealers there don't have the political power and protections they do in the US. The car companies there are moving to a direct sales model where the dealers will be paid to be delivery agents.

 

I am not aware of any special import taxes on non-EU produced vehicles. The Prius is priced just the same as every other Toyota (or other manufactures' cars) built and sold in Europe. I bought 2 of them in Germany and there was no special added pricing making it any more expensive than your equally equipped VW.

The import tax was something that was true in the 90s when EU manufacturers felt the pressure of Japanese manufactures bringing in quality and reliability that was not offered by the status quo (Fiat....and others). It has long been removed.

A lot of hybrids models not available in the USA (because marketing has decided everybody here must drive SUV/Crossovers and trucks), are actually built in the EU. The Yaris is a best seller there as it is less than 20kEUR (the hybrid model) and offers fuel efficiency that is orders of magnitude better than many "city" cars sold by others. The Honda Jazz/Fit hybrid also sells really well.

Hybrids sell well because, contrary to the USA, there are very few charging stations, electricity is expensive, and home charging is not a thing, as many people live in apartment blocks. Finding a parking spot is a problem, let alone of whether it has a plug next to it. Hybrid is the best way, other than stinky diesels, to significantly save on gas (on average 8-10$/gal) and taxes (i.e., in Germany CO2 emissions play a big role in how much you pay in taxes for owning and driving a car on their roads) in the EU. Those EU countries that are more progressive, EV sales do have some significance. Norway is a corner case, unfortunately.

 

Supposedly, the import tariff was 10% as of last year.
Importing a Car Into Germany | How To Germany

The Yaris hybrid came to be because Toyota didn't want to build an Aqua/Prius c factory in the EU, nor import the car. Instead, they put the Aqua drive train into the EU made Yaris. The Auris hybrid was also popular, and the Corolla that replaced it might be hybrid only in some EU markets. Being domestic assembled meant they avoid import taxes that are on the Prius.

Hybrids sell better in Europe vs in the US because of the fuel prices. Toyota reported them doing better in the years after dieselgate.

 

I stand corrected. The abolition of the 10% import tax has been abolished (I am not clear if progressively or completely) since 2019 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_Partnership_Agreement_(Japan-EU). I thought it was abolished a lot earlier. I cannot find an article in English outlining the details of the agreement pertaining to import of JP-built passenger cars into the EU.

On the other hand the price of the Prius and other JP produced cars has more to do with the Yen/EUR X-rate than any import tax. I never read or heard that the 10% import tax was preventing good business of Japanese manufacturers in the EU. Same goes BTW for Korean manufacturers. And I never felt I was paying more my 2 Priuses because of an import tax.

The article you link applies to those wanting to import *privately* a non-EU built vehicle when taking residency in an EU country. It seems that it still applies to this day.
Net of any additional cost to make sure the vehicle is according to EU regulations. I honestly wouldn't recommend anybody changing continents to import their cars. It is such a hassle and a cost, it is cheaper to sell what you have and buy something new at your destination. Unless it is a really particular vehicle you really don't want to part from, or the company moving you foots the bill.

 

Didn't Toyota do this Yaris with Aqua Drivetrain in their facility in France? I remember a 1/2 dozen years ago they announced something that sounded like that.

I've always been a huge fan of the design/shape of the Yaris is and how it's way less ugly than the Aqua and was hoping one days to get a Yaris with an Aqua drivetrain and lower it and modify it to look super cool.

 

They did. Marketing and currency rates seem to be the reasons for not importing the Aqua for Europe. They might sell the Yaris hybrid alongside the Aqua in Japan now.

Now you can't even get a new Yaris in the US, and the youngest used is a Mazda.