Happy Monday! It’s May 11, 2026, and this is The Morning Shift — your daily roundup of the top automotive headlines from around the world, in one place. This is where you’ll find the most important stories that are shaping the way Americans drive and get around.
In this morning’s edition, we’re looking at Chinese auto sales in the wake of the war on Iran, as well as GM’s penalties for selling customer data. We’ll also look at Europe’s approach to the EV transition, and the first Chinese cars to make it to Canada under the countries’ new trade deal.
1st Gear: Chinese auto sales plummeted last month, with gas cars leading the way
China loves its EVs, but the nation’s fleet is still primarily comprised of internal combustion vehicles. Sales of those models, though, have been hit by the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran just as they have in other countries. Add in shifting tax rules, and it all made for a very bad April for Chinese car sales. From Bloomberg:
China’s car sales fell 21.5% in April after deliveries of gasoline vehicles plunged due to the Iran oil shock, and electric car demand wasn’t strong enough to counter the slump.
Sales of passenger vehicles declined to 1.4 million, the lowest figure for April since 2022, during Covid lockdowns. Deliveries of internal combustion engine cars dropped by a third, and new energy vehicles, which includes EVs and plug-in hybrids, fell 6.8%, according to data from the China Passenger Car Association.
The drop in EV sales shows how a potential boost in demand from from rising oil prices wasn’t enough to reverse domestic softness, due to the roll-back of trade-in subsidies and the return of a purchasing tax on EVs.
The plunge in gasoline car sales was “relatively severe and surpassed our expectation,” PCA General Secretary Cui Dongshu said in a briefing on Monday. “The hit from higher oil prices has had a serious impact on the market.”
It seems the PCA expected a drop in sales for April, given the shifting tax structure, but the impact of skyrocketing oil prices wasn’t something laid out in the association’s predictions.
2nd Gear: GM will pay nearly $13 million for its illegal data sales
General Motors sold a bunch of customer data, and it got in big trouble for the practice. Well, it got in trouble. A slap on the wrist, more like. From Reuters:
GM has agreed to pay $12.75 million to resolve a California investigation into allegations that the Detroit automaker illegally sold two data brokers detailed information about the driving habits of hundreds of thousands of Californians, state Attorney General Rob Bonta said on Friday.
The settlement, subject to court approval, includes $12.75 million in civil penalties. It also restricts GM’s use of consumer driving data compiled about subscribers to its OnStar service and a ban on such data being sold to brokers. It includes a five-year ban on sales of personal data.
The data that GM sold to the brokers included names, phone numbers and home addresses. It detailed the GPS location of where OnStar subscribers drove and parked their vehicles.
GM from 2016 through 2024 also kept track of speeds traveled and incidences of rapid acceleration, the state said. Media reports said this data about driving behavior was shared with auto insurers who used it to justify rate increases in some places, although Bonta said California law bars insurers in the state from using such information to set rates.
California said GM reportedly made approximately $20 million nationwide from these data sales and added GM collected this data through consumers’ use of OnStar, which can provide directions or summon an ambulance in case of a crash, among other functions.
Just to reiterate: GM sold companies data on drivers, including their names, phone numbers, home addresses, and the GPS locations where they drove and parked. It made $20 million doing this. It’s paying $12.75 million in fines. I’m no mathemagician, but it feels like the bigger number there is the wrong one.
3rd Gear: Europe has nearly $235 billion on the EV transition
There are two major approaches to the incoming age of the electric vehicle. One is the tactic the United States has taken, which has been largely equivalent to shoving our collective hands in our ears and yelling until electric cars go away. The other is the tactic the rest of the world has done, which is to invest in EV infrastructure with the goal of accelerating the change. Europe picked the latter path, to the tune of nearly $235 billion. From Reuters:
Countries of the European economic area and Switzerland have committed almost 200 billion euros ($235 billion) of investments into their electric vehicle ecosystem, data from New Automotive showed on Monday.
Investments were mainly focused on the battery supply chain, with 109 billion euros engaged so far, as the continent tries to challenge a Chinese monopoly on battery production.
…
“Europe now produces batteries for roughly one in three EVs sold domestically, and announced capacity could meet future demand if fully utilised,” New Automotive said.
Some 60 billion euros were invested in EV manufacturing, centred on the conversion of legacy automotive plants alongside selective new EV-only facilities, said the research body whose stated mission is to accelerate the switch to electric cars.
Investments in charging infrastructure covered between 23 billion and 46 billion euros of public roll-out, with over 1 million public charging points having been deployed across Europe. More than 3.5 billion euros were invested in manufacturing of this infrastructure.
For its investment, Europe created six figures worth of jobs. The United States, by contrast, is now arguing that breathable air is for the limp wristed and acid rain is based and redpilled.
4th Gear: Canada’s first Chinese cars under its new trade agreement will come from Lotus
Canada has long been sorting out the minutiae of a new trade deal with China, after the former nation stopped receiving cars from the latter thanks to massive tariffs. Now, Chinese cars can slowly begin trickling back into the great white north, and Geely is kicking things off with Lotus. From Automotive News:
Geely says it has become the first Chinese company to export electric vehicles from China to Canada under a new trans-Pacific trade deal, after it shipped 18 Lotus Eletre crossovers on May 7.
Lotus owner Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co. is exporting the vehicles to Canada after the government in Ottawa agreed in January to allow up to 49,000 China-built EVs each year at a 6.1 percent tariff rate.
The Eletre is produced at a plant in the central China city of Wuhan constructed by Geely for the British sports car brand’s electrified models. The crossover went on sale in China in September, starting at 538,000 yuan ($79,120).
The Eletre is the first high-end EV model to pass certification under Canada Motor Vehicle Safety Standards, according to Lotus’ China sales company.
In related news, I still can’t spell “minutiae” correctly on my first try. It feels like there’s supposed to be one more “I” in there, doesn’t it?
Reverse: What will they think of next?
(Old-timey voice) By jove! Tires without tubes? That’s the greatest thing since sliced bread, which is at this point only 19 years old!
The Fuel Up
Nearly four cents down from last week! I certainly don’t mind the job security, but I also wouldn’t mind if prices would level out for five minutes.
On The Radio: The Kooks – ‘Naïve’
Sometimes it’s just a Kooks day.
