🟡 Hyundai & Kia EV Exports to U.S. Plunge 88% in Jan–May 2025

📅 July 23, 2025

✍️ Reporter: Park Young-woo (JoongAng Ilbo)

🧾 Summary (non-simplified)

Hyundai Motor Group's electric vehicle (EV) exports to the U.S. collapsed by 88% in the first five months of 2025 (7,156 units), compared to 59,705 units in the same period of 2024. This marks a sudden reversal following several years of growth, driven partly by expanded local production in the U.S. (Georgia), but also by declining domestic sales. Hyundai and Kia's EV sales within the U.S. shrank 28% year-on-year, against a 5.2% overall EV market increase. The upcoming expiration of the EV tax credit under Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA)” this September is expected to further deteriorate sales. Analysts warn the group may lose up to ₩2.7 trillion in sales annually.

⚖️ Five Laws of Epistemic Integrity

1. ✅ Truthfulness of Information

🟢 The article provides factual and internally consistent quantitative data (year-on-year comparison, unit exports, local production volume). Historical trends from 2021–2025 are well-sequenced.

2. 📎 Source Referencing

🟡 Moderately compliant. The report cites KAMA, Wards Intelligence, and KEF, but without direct links or full methodological details. Additional validation would strengthen credibility.

3. 🧭 Reliability & Accuracy

🟡 Reliable in terms of figures and source institutions. However, lacks qualitative context on U.S. consumer behavior, IRA regulatory shifts, or Hyundai’s strategic intent behind reshoring.

4. ⚖️ Contextual Judgment

🟠 Partial. The article frames the EV collapse as a company-specific failure, without fully addressing broader geopolitical, regulatory, or macroeconomic pressures (e.g., “Trumpflation,” trade war shifts, protectionism).

5. 🔍 Inference Traceability

🟡 Partially traceable. The chain of causality (export ↓ due to local production ↑ + tax credits ↓ + sales ↓) is logical, but simplified. More nuanced causal modeling (e.g., EV consumer sentiment, charging infra lag, Chinese EV competition) is absent.

🧩 Structured Opinion (BBIU Analysis)

The 88% collapse in Hyundai and Kia’s EV exports to the U.S. is not merely a market fluctuation — it is a strategic pressure point triggering a deeper structural shift. While public attention focuses on declining sales and halted production lines, what’s unfolding behind the scenes is far more consequential.

We are witnessing the early phase of a broad and coordinated relocation of Korea’s industrial backbone.

Hyundai’s retreat from exports coincides with a pivot to U.S.-based production (Georgia), aligned with Trump’s OBBBA regime. But it is not alone:

• SK Group, crippled by the SKT cyberattack, is rerouting strategic capital and operational attention to the U.S. and Southeast Asia.

• Samsung is reassigning key personnel and intellectual assets outside Korea while maintaining public silence on Lee’s economic strategy.

• Lotte, LG, and others are reconfiguring their operational centers abroad under joint ventures and neutral corporate structures.

This is not anecdotal. It’s systemic.
And it’s silent — precisely because its acknowledgment would trigger political and economic backlash.
The chaebols are packing their bags, not in protest, but in preparation.
What was once framed as “global expansion” is now quiet exit.

Hyundai’s export failure is therefore just the tip of the iceberg — a visible disruption beneath which lies a symbolic decoupling from the national frame.