Hey, Cam, mind sending me over our new Wi-Fi password. Oh, sorry, Mitch, you can't be trusted. What's your phone? It's different than mine. Cam! And I thought I was a judgey one. No, it's just messages between different devices aren't encrypted. Okay. Since when do you know about encryption? I know what encryption is, and it's because I'm the last line of defense against any would-be Wi-Fi thieves. Cam, come on. Okay, fine. I'll send it somewhere more private. Thank you. Safely send messages between different devices. On what's up, message privately with everyone. The dawn of a new season of Futurama is coming to Hulu July 29th. That's great, but I have to warn you, it's completely brilliant. The interplanetary hit is back. The very survival of Earth is at stake. Is everybody okay? Is anybody hurt? Nobody's okay. Everybody's hurt. Watch the all-new season of Futurama. That's the best damn show I ever saw. July 29th, streaming only on Hulu. Welcome to the Total Car Score podcast. Bring you the world of cars from inside the car. And now your hosts, Carl Brower, Lauren Vicks, and Javier Mota. Well, Carl, I'm back here in the U.S. after about nine days of skiing in Chile, which was amazing. The moment I got here, Lauren left for England for the speed of a festival in Woodwood, where we, you and me, drove a car, a fantastic car of what, 15 years ago? Can you believe that? No, I cannot believe that hot beer. But yeah, you and I drove a Mercedes 300 SL Galwing from Silverstone. Yeah. Yeah, 1953 car. So now, now over 60 years old, 70 years old, from Silverstone, where they had like Mercedes zones like that track and owns a facility, a hotel there, we drove it from Silverstone to the Goodwood Festival of Speed. And it was really nerve-wracking, because we're like in this car that we know is worth like seven figures and we're driving around that museum. Yeah, out of that museum. Yeah, on the wrong side of the road for us too, don't forget it too. So the car was great. Remember how the car was fine? Like the only thing that wasn't like totally confidence is fine was the brakes. Now, it was 70 year old brake technology. So it was like, you know, just allow yourself, but it kept up with highway speeds, no problem, the steering, the ride quality, everything else was fine. So yeah, so again, I just came back while we'll, we'll follow Lauren. Lauren's reports from Woodwood later. But again, so I came back from Chile and I was talking, obviously everybody's talking EVs everywhere. So my friends there asked me what car, what's the best one? And I told them, what about IKEA EV6? It's not on sale there yet. It will come later this year. Well, it's about $70,000 in Chile for the GT line. So not the GT performance version of it. And there in Chile, instead of putting incentives of buying the car, they put a tax because, a luxury tax because of the price. So the conversation went from EVs. So then I come back here and there's a ton of headlines that get me really confused. I don't know what's going on anymore. Now that I knew before, but. Well, that's good. I think if anyone claims they're not confused by the current EV situation, they're lying to you because it's kind of all over the map, right? We've seen nothing, but it's all EVs all the time as soon as possible for the last couple of years, but then the last like three months plus, we've heard every automaker pretty much acknowledge that, oh, they're not selling as well. We're cutting shifts. We're cutting back production. They're stacking up at dealer lots. So then you start thinking, okay, well, maybe we're getting a little more realistic on how long the EV transition is going to be. And then I just looked at and saw a report from the government that shows all this money the government is giving to automakers or like coming to diesel, trucking company, or the Bluebird bus company for school buses to produce EVs. So while we know that there are EVs stacking up and consumer demand doesn't seem to be meeting supply and they're having trouble selling these things, and they're used prices, by the way, that RC cars we're looking at online are completely cratering. You know, EVs, the average one to five-year-old EV used to be worth $40,000 a little over a year ago. Now they're worth $28,000, obviously. They're cheaper than the average non-EV. You have to pay, you basically have to incentivize used car shoppers with cheaper prices for the EVs to get them to buy them. They won't buy them unless they're cheaper than the equivalent gasoline car. Which means if you bought a new EV, you're taking a huge bath on your reset value. So all consumer, all consumer indications suggest that EV sales are slowing, EV sales are stalling, and there's not as much demand for them as they're supplied in the current set status. And I'm seeing all these reports and we're hearing all those reports about government incentives to massively ramp up EV production capacity in the next couple of years. So one of the studies that I saw when I came back, and I get so many, I mean, they're coming from all over the place. One of them was like, I guess it was like 40%, no, 60% of the current EV owners will go back to gas cars, because the experience wasn't that good. And then I found this one about the demand for EV batteries is projected to six-fold increase by 2030. That's the day that a lot of companies told us like five years ago, it'll be all electric. So again, what you said, the prices are up, the cars are not selling consumers, according to that other study, are not really convinced I want to go back to gas cars. And then you say like the government is putting a ton of money into EVs, maybe because link to this project for like the battery investment will six-fold in the next five years, basically. Yeah, but I saw that study, but then it also acknowledged that even if there was that much demand increase, which I highly question, there's this question about where they're going to get the supply, right? Where are they going to get all the lithium and nickel and all that kind of stuff? Don't forget that over the last 10 years, China saw this coming, and in my opinion, they largely engineered it. They saw this huge demand in EVs coming, and they cornered the market on global lithium supply and a lot of the other rare earth metals. So I heard from an insider who you know, and a lot of the people in the industry know he's a well-respected person, that is an incredibly well-respected automaker. And he basically told me over a year ago on a press trip, when we were talking privately, his quote was, "We are so screwed. China has control of all these global supplies for battery production, and we're all going to be at their mercy if we start trying to ramp it up." So you could make an argument that pushing toward EVs and rushing into the EV, world and EV transition is synonymous with handing what's left of our manufacturing base in the Western world to China. We've already lost our medicine and our handheld technologies and pretty much anything with the circuit board. We've already handed that to them. Now we're going to hand over all of our car industry as well. Well, maybe my connection with Chile will be the savior, because Chile, in the Akatama desert in the north, they have a lot of lithium there. It's very early in the production. So obviously China has a huge advance in the infrastructure of producing the lithium, or sourcing out the lithium to produce the battery. So it's a way long for Chile, but maybe there's a little hope there that they can do it there. Chile is an ally of, it was well, maybe not, because now they have a communist in the government, so I don't know. Well, exactly. He has two more years in power, we'll see. Well, and that's what I would see happening is, is China will show up on the door of, on Chile's doorstep, saying, "Hey, they're already there. What do I mean, will, they are already there." So there you go. So yeah, China has, remember they always say that certain societies and certain cultures think in terms of quarters, and other cultures think in terms of centuries, and the ones that think in terms of centuries are the ones that with the advantage. And you can probably smart enough to figure out which cultures are which in this way, but one of them was smart enough to quarter the market on Lithium for over the last decade, and now I don't think it's about, it's overstating it to say in most simple terms as my friend in the industry said, we're screwed. But anyways, that's where we're at. So another related story to Chile is that another friend of mine was talking about investment and which investment is kind of all now because of this government of a communist party. So for the past two years, the economy has slowed down a lot. Everything is kind of expensive, so there's a lot of hope. And he was telling me that a company from the Netherlands came with the idea of investing on something. And the first thing he told is like, "Okay, here's the product we need. This is the amount." But before that, before all that, I want to let you know that we have a list of countries where we don't feel. The dawn of a new season of Futurama is coming to Hulu July 29. That's great. But I have to warn you, it's completely brilliant. The interplanetary hit is bad. The very survival of Earth is at stake. Is everybody okay? Is anybody hurt? Nobody's okay. Everybody's hurt. Watch the all-new season of Futurama. That's the best damn show I ever saw. July 29, streaming only on Hulu. Meet the next generation of podcast stars, with SiriusXM's Listen Next program presented by State Farm. As part of their mission to help voices be heard, State Farm teamed up with SiriusXM to uplift diverse and emerging creators. Tune in to Stars and Stars with ESA, as host ESA Nakazawa dives into birth charts of her celeb guests. This is just the start of a new wave of podcasting. Visit statefarm.com to find out how we can help prepare for your future. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. That can be 100% trusted in terms of doing business. She lays in that lease. So, I don't know. I mean, they might have the resources, they might have the lithium, but getting it out of there might not be that easy either. Yep. Yeah, I know. And don't forget, too, that there's all these tariffs coming in that we're supposed to do to make Chinese cars more expensive. But that's if they come from China. Now, if China starts building the cars in what we consider a free trade country, like Mexico, which is what it looks like they're going to start doing, then they're going to basically sidestep the supposed protections we have in place right now to keep Chinese imports from coming in and having $10,000 electric vehicles that make our $40,000 electric vehicles look, well, overpriced and over expensive, which they would be at that point. Yeah, that was the case with the Volvo EX30 that we drove last year, and was actually on the lease for World Car of the Year. And now it's been delayed for next year, because the tariff increases are not only for the US for Europe, too. And they're trying to change the production from China to GANS in Belgium. It's like a huge issue for them, obviously, because they invested a lot of money in that car, and now it's delayed basically two years, I think, at least for the US market. So I mean, again, I don't think I can go back on vacation again. Right? Only if you're driving an EV when you do. Don't even chill here because, again, the first trucks are there. I mean, there are some buildings, I have to say, some of my friends' apartment buildings have EV chargers. Do you see a few of them on the street? Actually, Kia has a kind of a cool program. Remember when Smart had that program here in the US where you could pick up a car in any street, and then within a radius of that street, you can just drop it anywhere? I don't remember the name of the company. They stopped it because of the cities like Miami, taxed them to the roof, and it wasn't a profitable, but the system works. And in Chile, they're doing that. Kia is sponsoring that, actually. So it's happening as long as the streets aren't littered with the smarts left over the place, like we see when you go to big cities with the scooters, which have the same system. Yeah, I just leave it wherever. And it's like, well, people do just leave them wherever. Yeah. So do we have any optimistic or any positive news? Like, did I miss anything? I was away. Let's see. There was a presidential debate. Did you hear about that? Oh, no, no, I don't want to hear about that. It's even more complicated. Yeah, I mean, I feel like there's a lot of things that are kind of on this kind of cusp, you know, and it's like the next six months between elections and legislation and all these other things and where the market's going with EVs, the next 12 months are going to be very interesting. We'll see where we are. We should mark this date, whatever, July 10th. Because a year from now could be very interesting. Yeah, yeah. So anyway, what are you driving this week? I hope an EV, maybe? Oh, so perfect. Anyway, I just gave back on Monday, just a couple days ago, a Toyota Prius Prime. But I wrote a story and shot a video while I had it that essentially says the Prius Prime is the best vehicle for the largest number of people. So, you know, I had, and you know how here they never give us base models, but they gave me a base, I think it's the SE versus the XC one. It was the base model, which means it's $34,000, including destination charge out the door for this car. In a world where the average new car is like 50,000, the average new EVV is like 60,000. This car is $34,000. It goes 44 miles, as you know, on a full charge of its battery pack. Then it goes another like 500 plus miles on its gas lane, where it gets like 50 miles to the gallon practically. And it looks good and it handles well. And it's fast because it's got an electric like drivetrains. It's got all that broad torque band to people. It's the car. And it's even though it's a sand, it's a hatchback really. And it's got 20 cubic feet of cargo space behind the second row seat. And it goes up to like 27 if you hold that seat down. It's not really an SUV, but it's got an SUV like trick. For me, I don't know how anyone argues that plug-in hybrids are the best near-term solution. And I don't know how anyone argues that the cheapest plug-in hybrid you can buy also happens to be one of the best looking and best performing. And that's the Toyota Prius. So you're hearing it from one of the most diehard performance guys who's made fun of Prius, the Toyota Prius for over 20 years since it hit the market in 2001 and looked like some kind of weird anime car from Japan because that's what it was. That was when they just imported the Japanese market one. And they redesigned it for the US in '04. And it looked a little better, but it still was a Toyota Prius. I would seriously consider, I am seriously considering buying a Toyota Prius prime right now. And I would tell anyone who's who's using the right side of their brain, the logical side of their brain, to and wants to buy the right, the best car, I would say. You cannot logically argue against a Toyota Prius prime. It's the best car out there right now. Yeah, exactly. And to complete the circle about the conversations here and in Chile while I was there, that was my recommendation. Like, you don't buy an electric car now because in that market, there are way more expensive than here. The infrastructure is way behind that we are in the US. So your best option if you want to be quote unquote, electrified will be a plug-in hybrid car. Yeah, and everyone's like saying, well, you know, they're just a bridge. I had a guy arguing with me on LinkedIn when I posted my videos, calling them bridge to nowhere and EVs are better in every way. And it was really fun to kind of take him apart with like actual facts because again, I'm an analyst and you and I've been in this industry forever and we know what's really going on. And, you know, the cost per mile hobby, that study where we showed that the averaging is driven 10,000 a year and the average electric and hybrid sorry, the average hybrid and gasoline and plug-in hybrid cars driven over 12,000 miles a year and the average electric cars driven 10,000. So that's 20% less use that they're getting. They cost more when you buy them and they lose more value over time. So you pay more up front and lose more value during your ownership to drive them 20% less. They literally couldn't be any worse. It's like, well, I guess they could catch fire and light your house on fire. But that was a wait. Wasn't the Chevy, wasn't the Chevy bolt? Anyways, anyway, so you're not being sure it is for that, right? Which is not too. I always thought that was like the greatest as in scariest, funniest recall notice I ever heard, right? It's like, don't drive the car in the rain. The wipers might not work or even don't drive the car at all because the brakes are having problems. This recall notice was parking at least 40 feet from your house. It's like, wow, no. That's a recall notice. Get it away from your house. Sometimes I really live in it. So anyway, I will be looking at your stories, especially the one about the investment from different companies in the government in the EP market, which still, I think is going to be interesting. As you said, in the next 12 months, we're going to see where the world will go, right? Yes. Yeah, we're going to have some political shifts. We're going to have some market shifts. We're going to see. Everyone's saying, well, EV cells aren't dropping. It's just the growth is slowing. And I always wanted to say, okay, what's the first step of something dropping? What's it to do before it drops? Exactly. Give me one guess. Well, Carl, nice talking to you. I wish we were with Lauren with driving again, or maybe other Mercedes from 70 years ago, but that's not the case this time. Yeah, well, I hope she I'm sure she'll enjoy it like we did. And next time we talk, maybe all three of us will be there be together. Okay, so follow Carl, Carl with a K at Carl Brouwer, me at Javier Mota and Lauren fix at Lauren fix the car coach car coach. Sorry. Okay, Carl, thank you. Thanks Javier. Talk to you soon. Bye. Bye. Thank you for listening. For more, check us out online at totalcarscore.com. When you meet a burger that's got as much drip as you do, you know, it's time to start rocking a napkin bed with your fit. No shame. Once everyone catches on to how fresh and juicy the double quarter pounder with cheese is, they'll all be stuntin' napkin fits. I swear. Meet the next generation of podcast stars with SiriusXM's Listen Next program presented by State Farm. As part of their mission to help voices be heard, State Farm teamed up with SiriusXM to uplift diverse and emerging creators. Tune in to stars and stars with ESA as host ESA Nakazawa dives into birth charts of her celeb guests. This is just the start of a new wave of podcasting. Visit State Farm dot com to find out how we can help prepare for your future. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. [BLANK_AUDIO]
