Mercedes Lost 94% of Its Car Profit — And China Owns a Fifth of It

Mercedes-Benz lost 94% of the profit from selling cars in a single quarter this summer — from €783 million down to €49 million. Three months. In the last video on this channel, Porsche lost 93%. Mercedes has just beaten it. And the largest shareholder in the company that invented the motor car is BAIC — a carmaker owned by the Chinese government. The second largest is Li Shufu, the Chinese billionaire behind Geely, which owns Volvo, Lotus, Polestar, Zeekr and a stake in Aston Martin. Between them they hold 19.67% of Mercedes. That matters more than it sounds. A bill drafted in the US Congress this year defines a carmaker as controlled by a foreign adversary if foreign persons from that country hold 15% of it. The penalty is up to a five-year ban on building, importing or selling cars in America — where Mercedes has a plant in Alabama. It's a draft, not law. But as written, reporting suggests the exemptions wouldn't protect Mercedes. How it got here: the strategy that abandoned volume for luxury pricing, built on record profits that were really a chip shortage in disguise. The EQS, engineered for a 0.20 drag coefficient and rejected by customers who said it didn't look like a Mercedes. The AMG C63 that lost its V8 for a four-cylinder hybrid. The move to fixed-price agency selling in Britain. And above all China — down 28% in the first half to its lowest level since 2016, as buyers switched to BYD, Nio and Xiaomi. A €704 million write-down on Chinese investments is what produced that 94%. Also covered honestly: why the group's overall profit rose 22% in the same quarter and what that actually tells you, why the vans and the finance arm are now carrying a company that spun off its trucks to become pure luxury, and why BAIC itself is now facing a loss of up to RMB 1.65 billion. Do you drive a Mercedes? Did you know who owns it? Tell me in the comments. mercedes benz, mercedes profit, mercedes china, mercedes crisis, baic mercedes, li shufu, geely, mercedes shareholders, eqs, amg c63, ola kallenius, mercedes job cuts, german car industry, porsche crisis, byd, xiaomi, luxury car market, chinese ownership european cars, car industry 2026, uk car news