A snapshot of motorcycle and ATV industry share performance across key manufacturers and major global markets at the trading week closure on Friday 31 January 2025. BDN financial editor Roger Willis reports.
USA — WHOOPS! APOCALYPSE…
The new oligarchy of Silicon Valley tech billionaires, who have signed up for subservience to President Trump, suddenly had the rug pulled from under their comfort zone — and wallets — by the unveiling of much cheaper but nevertheless seriously efficacious Chinese Artificial Intelligence start-up DeepSeek. Its arrival stoked a rout for Wall Street tech stocks, some temporarily losing billions of dollars in value.
By the end of the week, most New York market indices were still smarting in their punishment zones. The blue-chip S&P 500 closed 1% down, tech-heavy NASDAQ Composite stocks were 1.6% in arrears and S&P”s MidCap 400 had fallen by 1.1%. Only the crusty old Dow Jones Industrial Average hung on in there, rising by just 0.3%.
To be fair to the MidCap, though, most of its woes were linked to imminent weak full-year corporate results, knocking share prices in advance. Harley-Davidson, Polaris, Textron and LiveWire all belonged to this category.
| Currency: dollar | Price | Week | Month |
| Harley-Davidson | 27.06 | -4.4% | -9.8% |
| Polaris Industries | 47.70 | -11.4% | -17.6% |
| Textron | 76.51 | -0.9% | 1% |
| Niu Technologies | 2.02 | +2.5% | +14.1% |
| LiveWire | 3.15 | -10.3% | -36.4% |
EUROPE — A SPURT OF MONTH-END ADVANTAGE
European stocks finished January outpacing other major global equity markets, as fears of sweeping US tariffs subsided and investors swerved around the shakeout in US tech stocks. Among market indices, Frankfurt’s Dax Xetra had the best showing with a 1.6% gain. The FTSE MIB in Milan put on a more modest rise of 0.7%.
However, Trump spoofed them by waiting until the first day of February to launch his tariff assault, hitting Canada and Mexico with 25% impositions. In both cases, these will have a severe impact on cross-border automotive assembly activities, in due course spreading to European suppliers operating in those countries and shipping to the US.
Latest episode in Austria’s KTM saga was a claim by MV Agusta that it has escaped the grasp of Pierer Mobility’s insolvency and regained ownership of the Varese-based business — although quite where the money to achieve this objective came from is currently opaque.
| Currency: euro | Price | Week | Month |
| BMW | 78.60 | -0.3% | +2.9% |
| Volkswagen | 101.40 | +1.8% | +14.4% |
| Pierer Mobility | 18.15 | -4% | -14.8% |
| Piaggio Group | 2.16 | +2.4% | +0.9% |
JAPAN — READY FOR RESULTS
Tokyo and Osaka’s key Nikkei 225 market index returned to negativity, falling by 0.9%, after the previous week’s brief dose of light relief. The four big indigenous biker brands were unaffected by investor nerves, as their quarterly reports are anticipated in the next few days.
| Currency: yen | Price | Week | Month |
| Honda | 1478.5 | N/A | -3.7% |
| Yamaha | 1304 | +0.2% | -7.2% |
| Suzuki | 1869 | +0.1% | +4.4% |
| Kawasaki | 7066 | +2.8% | -2.9% |
INDIA — ON THE UP AGAIN
Healthier quarterly results content was also anticipated in India, as the S&P BSE Sensex and NSE Nifty 50 market indices shrugged off recent negativity to respectively climb by 1.7% and 1.8%. Four of the leading Indian motorcycle manufacturers enjoyed muscular rising weekly share prices. Royal Enfield parent Eicher didn’t, but that was almost certainly due to early speculative profit-taking by hordes of “retail” investors.
| Currency: rupee | Price | Week | Month |
| Hero MotoCorp | 4339.15 | +7.1% | +2.3% |
| Bajaj Auto | 8847.80 | +5.3% | -1.3% |
| TVS Motor | 2457.90 | +8.2% | -1% |
| Eicher Motors | 5194.30 | -0.2% | -2.2% |
| Mahindra | 2989.85 | +6.7% | -6.3% |
CHINA — YEAR OF THE SNAKE
Chinese equities investment activity had completely ground to a halt by 29 January, as punters went on the lash to celebrate China’s Lunar New Year — The Year of the Snake! Two days of previous desultory business saw Shanghai’s SSE Composite and the blue-chip CSI 300 market indices respectively decline by 0.1% and 0.4%. Normal service will begin to resume when markets open again on 4 February.
| Currency: yuan | Price | Week | Month |
| Qianjiang | 19.92 | +0.9% | +9.2% |
| Zongshen | 21.70 | -3.2% | +1.3% |
| Sundiro | 3.48 | +2.7% | +1.2% |
| CETC (Jialing) | 12.53 | -1.6% | -1.4% |
| Lifan | 6.20 | -2.5% | -3.3% |
| Loncin | 10.15 | +0.6% | +22.7% |
| Linhai | 9.15 | +0.9% | +12% |
| Guangzhou Auto Group | 8.60 | N/A | +0.7% |
| CFMoto | 206.38 | +6.9% | +36.6% |
| Xinri E-Vehicle | 10.17 | +0.3% | +4.3% |