Porsche AG is expecting a dip in sales after consumers pulled forward purchases earlier this year to beat U.S. President Donald Trump’s auto tariffs.
Drivers rushed to buy vehicles to get ahead of the duties, Porsche’s procurement chief Barbara Frenkel said Tuesday. The German manufacturer is one of the carmakers most exposed to the levies because it lacks a factory in the U.S.
“There will be a dip, and then we need to see how the consumer will come back,” Frenkel said at a conference organized by the Financial Times in London.
The Volkswagen AG-controlled brand is grappling with waning demand for electric vehicles, slumping sales in China and now additional costs from the trade tensions. The U.S. recently surpassed China as Porsche’s top market thanks to robust demand for its Macan and Cayenne sport utility vehicles, but it imports all its cars from Europe.
Porsche is still weighing price increases as it won’t be able to absorb the cost of the current tariffs on its own, Frenkel said. The uncertainty sparked by the duties is weighing on consumer spending, with drivers possibly facing a different price tag for the same car from one day to the next, she added.
“If I would be a customer, I would not understand it,” she said. “If the whole industry needs to raise the prices, and you have a new baseline, this is a new game — but in the time between there will be a dip.”
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