15 May 2026 – Oliver Zipse is leaving BMW with an uncomfortable truth: Brussels’ trade policy does more harm to Europe than good. Slight correction in nickel, but with further upside potential.
Nickel: Slight Correction, but the Outlook Is Right
Today’s slight decline in SHFE nickel contracts is likely less fundamental in nature and more attributable to contract rollovers.
Because the news surrounding nickel tells a different story: Indonesia’s HMA reference price for nickel has risen to just under USD 18,850/dmt for the second half of May – an increase of almost 6%. NPI spot remains tight, MHP payables are holding at a high level, and sulfur supply remains geopolitically tense.
Our assessment: the slight pullback is a technical pause, not a trend reversal. At the beginning of the week, nickel is likely to point north again.
Farewell Speech with a Clear Message: BMW CEO Takes EU Trade Policy to Task
Oliver Zipse is leaving BMW with an uncomfortable truth: Brussels’ trade policy does more harm to Europe than good.
Punitive Tariffs That Hit the Consumer
In his farewell speech before BMW’s Annual General Meeting, Zipse said what many in the EU think but far too rarely say out loud: EU punitive tariffs on electric vehicles from China are not a protective instrument – they are a hidden tax on consumers. Who pays? The customers. Always.
BMW produces and sells in China, for China. For the EU Commission to impose tariffs where European manufacturers have long since become locally rooted is not strategic calculation. It is short-sightedness.
Promises Without Implementation
The transatlantic tariff dispute also affects BMW directly: 15% on exports to the United States means higher expenses – with nothing in return. The EU has announced that tariffs are supposed to fall to 0%. To this day, that announcement has not been implemented. The emphasis, as Zipse dryly noted, is on “supposed to.”
Tariff Walls Weaken – They Do Not Protect
Zipse put it categorically: tariffs do not protect. They harm all sides. An industry behind tariff walls becomes weaker. And it shrinks. A global production network, by contrast, is a strength, not a vulnerability. E-mobility in particular is simply not possible without global supply chains.
Something that, in our view, can be applied analogously to the EU’s planned steel tariffs and quota reductions.
The Conclusion of a Pragmatist
Markets work. Political interventions in trade flows do not. Brussels should listen. But it does not.
Meanwhile, the Chinese and Americans are now sitting at one table and talking about shared opportunities and new partnerships. The Brussels technocrats, on the other hand, prefer to sit in their ivory tower, acting high and mighty and preaching morality!
Thorsten Gerber, CEO of the Gerber Group, said today: “BMW is the German car manufacturer that has navigated the challenges and crises of recent years most successfully, thanks to a leader such as Mr Zipse, who possesses far greater expertise than those who have for decades been notorious for their political actions and lobbying aimed at market protectionism.”
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