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American Cars: Rejected by China
Inside the Political and Technological Collapse of a Once-Profitable Market
In the early 2010s, China was the promised land for American automakers. General Motors sold more vehicles there than in its home country. Buick, a brand fading into irrelevance in North America, was reborn as a prestige marque in Chinese cities. Ford had late but strong momentum, while Chrysler quietly moved metal through joint ventures. For a while, it looked like Detroit’s future was tethered to China’s rising middle class, and that America’s combustion engine muscle would fuel another golden age, just on different soil. That future didn’t materialize, but Trump 2.0’s trade war and Chinese nationalist pride did.
The numbers speak with a clarity few corporate strategy memos ever achieve. In Q1 2014, American-branded internal combustion vehicles sold in China in volumes approaching 1.2 million. By Q1 2025, that number had collapsed to around 250,000. This wasn’t a momentary blip or a COVID hangover. It was a structural collapse. While the total Q1 auto market in China hit new highs — over 7.4 million vehicles in early 2025 — American ICE brands lost four out of every…
