Welcome in, today is Friday, October ninth, and we begin with Automotive News, and Chinese automakers at Canada's door. Certification is the gate, and four Chinese automakers are close to clearing it. Automotive News reports that as many as four domestic China automakers are set to have models certified for Canada by early next year, and are nearing the finish line on sales networks with local retailers, according to Tim Reuss, chief executive of the Canadian Automobile Dealers Association. That account names BYD, Chery, Geely and Dongfeng, and notes that BYD, Chery and Geely have each launched Canadian websites in recent weeks. The dealer contracts are the detail that moves this from ambition to inventory, inside a tariff-shaped market shared with the United States. Industry reaction leans skeptical of reading export volume as strength, with a recurring concern about whether service networks and parts availability will be there for buyers. Also today, a development on our earlier report of Toyota and Hyundai gaining ground on GM and Ford. John Irwin, writing in Automotive News, argues that weaker electric-vehicle demand and surging hybrid demand are reshaping the race for United States sales supremacy. The argument turns on one split: electrified models are a majority of Toyota's volume this year, against less than four percent of GM's. On that read, the sales crown is now a referendum on powertrain mix. Industry reaction leans toward treating hybrids as a durable, profitable middle step rather than a stopgap, though a recurring counter-read holds that headline share loss understates the incumbent's position, pointing to segment strength in pickups and large SUVs. Separately, Volkswagen has extended Rivian one billion dollars in long-term funding, Just Auto reports. The same reporting frames it inside the five point eight billion dollar joint venture the two companies created to develop technologies for future models, including subcompact cars expected to launch in twenty twenty-seven. For suppliers tracking electric-vehicle platform programs, the tranche keeps that launch timeline a funded reference point rather than a stated intention. Investor reaction leans toward reading the money as runway rather than growth capital, with a recurring framing that it is a pre-committed tranche of the existing venture rather than fresh conviction, and some pairing softer electric-vehicle demand with per-vehicle losses on the cheaper model to argue the news was already priced in. Staying with trade. Mexican vehicle exports to the United States fell five percent in the first nine months of the year, while shipments to Canada, Mexico's next-biggest market, rose just over nine percent. Those figures come from AMIA, the country's main auto chamber, reported by Automotive News. The same reporting has data from the statistics office, INEGI, released October seventh, showing the biggest export slump so far this year, a decline analysts attributed to United States tariff policy, and has AMIA noting Mexico still supplies sixteen percent of light vehicles in a United States market that has shrunk two percent this year. For plant allocation and cross-border logistics contracts, that is volume being redirected rather than lost. A recurring note in trade commentary is the build-out of Chinese automaker retail footprints inside Mexico, which some tie to urgency around the USMCA review. Now, a few more headlines moving the trade today. Following our earlier report on Brussels asking Beijing to cap hybrid exports, Just Auto reports that China has refused voluntary curbs, and the European Commission is now weighing temporary safeguard tariffs, a route that requires no proof of unfair trade practices. Mercedes-Benz car deliveries fell eight percent, a decline Just Auto reports the company linked primarily to weaker China demand, offsetting higher deliveries in Europe and North America and a sharp rise in battery-electric sales. BYD's global sales rose seventeen percent in September, per Just Auto, which reports that growth continues to be driven by overseas markets. Porsche plans price increases of around twenty percent on high-end models, part of what Just Auto reports is the company's Sportwagenschmiede '35 strategy, following the turnaround plan we covered this week. And finally, Waymo is finalising more than three billion dollars in unrated private debt from PIMCO, Blackstone and Sixth Street, its first borrowing after a decade of equity, according to a Bloomberg report carried by Startup Fortune.