Less than a year after joining the WTO, Russia finds itself dragged in front of the same. The EU launched a formal trade dispute with Russia, claiming that its Eastern neighbor is “illegally protecting its carmakers with a recycling fee levied on imported cars,” as Reuters reports. (Read More…)
Car sales in Russia disappointed a month ago, and they disappoint again: Russian sales of new cars and light commercial vehicles dropped 11 percent in June, says Reuters. For the first half of the year, sales are off 6 percent while Russia caught a whiff of the European contagion. Now, all hopes are on the government and cheap credit. (Read More…)
Russia is one of the BRIC countries, the folks that are supposed to power the world to new prosperity. Too bad Russia is running out of steam. Russian car sales dropped 12 percent in May, the Association of European Businesses (AEB) told Reuters. (Read More…)
Russians apparently love their dashboard mounted video cameras. Those cameras have provided us with eye popping as-they-happened views of car crashes, truck crashes, and even a plane crash or two. Sometimes the videos are of very close calls, others record vehicular mayhem, injuries and, sadly, fatalities. So it’s refreshing to see that someone has made a compilation of Russian dashcam videos that show human beings at their best, people stopping to help elderly and infirm pedestrians get through traffic safely or folks lending a hand to motorists and others in need of help.
The YouTube videos of the meteorite attack on Russia’s Chelyabinsk region come to you courtesy of a new custom. More and more Russian drivers have a video camera on the dash. (Read More…)
An alleged environmental measure will land Russia in the court of the World Trade Organization, a club Russia had joined only in August. Importers have to pay a “recycling fee” of around 5 percent of a car’s sticker price, local makers do not. “Russia’s trading partners say the new levy is a purely protectionist play under the guise of environmental ‘recycling’,” Reuters writes. “The European Union Trade Commissioner, Karel de Gucht, has threatened to invoke the disputes procedure of the World Trade Organization.” (Read More…)
We continue on our shopping list of what cars and carmakers sold best in the biggest markets in the world and after China and Europe, today we stop in Russia. Couldn’t care less? That’s ok, you can check out the best-selling models and brands in 171 additional countries and territories on my blog. Enjoy!
Back to Russia.
Oh and every time I write about car sales in Russia I can’t help but put that video up. I love it too much. Sorry.
Back to car sales. Lots-of-Ladas-but-not-only. In 6 words this is what happened last year in Russia.
I know you’re dying to know more. So jump!
It’s hard enough to find a decent used car for $3,000. Nissan’s new line of Datsun cars are being designed in mind with a starting price of $3,000, and there’s only one way to make sure the cars come in at such a rock-bottom sticker – use a pre-existing low-cost platform.
With the stroke of a few pens putting signatures under a contract in Moscow today, then Renault-Nissan Alliance has become Russia’s largest automaker. The Alliance took control of AVTOVAZ, maker of the market-leading Lada brand. Lada holds 30 percent of Russia’s rapidly growing car market. (Read More…)
After a thorough look at Japan on Monday, this week you get the privilege (?) of another sales update from Around the Globe, and we’re going to Russia with love.
Last time I took you to Russia was 18 months ago and since then there has been so much change that it’s not funny.
So not funny that it requires a new trip today. (Read More…)
The first model to be sold as a Datsun in three decades will start at less than $7,695 when it goes on sale in 2014.
With Accord sales tanking in Europe, Honda says it has no plans to bring a next-generation model to Europe, despite introducing variants for North America, Asia and Russia.
Next week, Russian and Japanese dignitaries will assemble in the frigid Siberian port city of Vladivostok to celebrate the opening of the first Japanese car plant in the Russian Far East. On September 6, Mazda will start Russian production of its best-selling CX-5 SUV and the new Mazda6 sedan, says The Nikkei [sub] – most likely after having received an invitation. (Read More…)
As part of a very Russian “incentive program”, GM is more than doubling the output of its wholly owned manufacturing facility in St. Petersburg, Russia. Annual production will increase to 230,000 vehicles by 2015, up from 98,000 units currently. (Read More…)
Who needs a mid-engined rice racer to drift? Latest dispatches from Russia show that with a little training, your can even drift when pulling a trailer. This creates so much enthusiasm that the camera car engages in a little sympathetic drifting as well.
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