![]() ![]() Lease the Volvo and get a $7,500 consumer tax credit (more on the “leasing loophole” later), and you’re looking at $28,745, about $20,000 less than the price of the average new car. Either way, the price remains a tempting $36,245 to start. Skepticism over that claim is bolstered by Volvo having to pay a stiff 27.5 percent tariff on every EX30 it imports to the United States from China. Volvo executives insist the car is designed to turn a profit. Some industry analysts suggest Geely and Volvo will take a financial loss on the EX30 to help establish an electric foothold outside of China. This EX30 may be small on the outside, but it carries outsize impact and a potential provocation to Western automakers and governments. And with Volvo helping Geely raise its international game, including styling the Zeekr X from its design center in Gothenburg, Sweden, Zeekr hopes to enter the European market itself in 2024. ![]() That was before the United Auto Workers went on strike to demand a (surely forthcoming) major hike in wages, and assurances of future job security in a tumultuous transition from internal-combustion-engine (ICE) technology to EVs. That all highlights China’s sobering EV advantages, including labor prices that Detroit’s Biden-backed union factories can’t touch. It costs about $7,000 less than Tesla’s most-affordable Model 3 sedan, and nearly $20,000 less than the larger Model Y SUV, despite Tesla’s ruthless price cuts, which have left Ford and other rivals reeling. $36,245 (including a $1,295 destination charge) flat-out kneecaps the prices of comparable EVs in North America and Europe. That makes the EX30 both a stalking horse-and potential Trojan horse-for affordable Chinese-built automobiles in North America and Europe alike. The proudly protectionist IRA carries an equally big stick, denying subsidies to anything with a whiff of Chinese (or Russian) provenance, in an effort to stem China’s global dominance over batteries and mineral refining. The Biden administration’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) aims to spur homegrown EV factories and a battery supply chain through the carrot of consumer and manufacturer incentives. And while the Volvo badge says “Sweden,” the EX30’s birthplace puts a target on its back in the United States. Geely Auto owns those Chinese-market brands, in addition to majority stakes in Volvo and Lotus. But the EX30 is made in China, at a Zhangjiakou factory that will also build its electric stablemates, the Zeekr X and Smart #1. The EX30 brings the hallmarks of larger Volvos: squeaky-clean Scandinavian design, a canny blend of comfort and performance, and an obsessive focus on safety. For such a tiny and intensely powerful EV-an “espresso shot” of Volvo, according to its maker-the new EX30 carries big hopes but plenty of baggage.
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