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Daily 5

Thursday, January 23, 2025

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The departure of Toyota's Jack Hollis is a head-scratcher

Welcome to the Daily 5 report for Thursday, Jan. 23.

Toyota Motor Corp. has executive turnover just like everyone else in the automotive and business worlds, but the difference is that the departure of key executives is usually orderly and signaled ahead. Toyota rarely uses the term "effective immediately" in these kinds of announcements. Toyota's North American unit has shown especially stable management for many years.

So our longtime Toyota reporter Larry P. Vellequette was surprised to learn of Jack Hollis' unexpected retirement as North American COO and sales chief on Wednesday at age 58. Mark Templin was named his successor.

As is often the case in these kinds of sudden departures, there's no obvious reason why it happened.

As we reported, Automotive News asked to speak with Hollis, but a company spokesman referred to a written statement from him. No other reason for the retirement was cited, but Hollis in the written statement said he was preparing "to take on new challenges." It's a good bet Hollis signed a nondisclosure, nondisparagement agreement that most companies require from departing executives as part of their severance deals. Today he made it known he's available for new opportunities on his LinkedIn page.

The exit of a popular, successful sales chief such as Hollis often triggers alarm bells among dealers. Not at Toyota. Vellequette, in seeking reaction from Toyota dealers, wrote: "Not a single one of them expressed any concern that the departure would in any way alter either their relationship with the Japanese automaker or the path that it was on."

In other news, Stellantis said another one of its brands will advertise during the Super Bowl on Feb. 9. We already knew Jeep would air a spot, but today the company said Ram would debut a commercial at the two-minute break of the second quarter.

Most automakers appear to be sitting out the Big Game this year. Kia, General Motors and several usual Super Bowl advertisers told our affiliate Ad Age that they aren't participating.

We'll see. We've been surprised before with unexpected automotive Super Bowl ads.

Speaking of GM, Cadillac said today it is giving its V-Series badge to its first electric vehicle — the Lyriq midsize crossover — and added that the high-performance variant will be its fastest vehicle ever, according to our story by Lindsay VanHulle.

Meanwhile, the chaos caused by the historic snowfall in New Orleans continues to wreak havoc on the 2025 NADA Show as organizers struggle to reschedule events and the all-important dealer make meetings. Automotive News and other organizations have been forced to cancel events because, well, people haven't been able to fly into New Orleans.

Fortunately, the show will go on as more people find their way into the Big Easy. You can follow everything here on our live blog.

Finally, in case you missed it, Ford Motor Co. issued yet another recall on its Bronco Sport crossover ― the 16th so far, according to NHTSA data compiled by Cars.com. The vehicle's 12-volt battery may experience degradation and suddenly fail, which can result in a loss of electrical accessories, including the hazard lights, or cause a loss of drive power, increasing the risk of a crash, NHTSA documents showed in the story from Reuters.

That's it for today. Have a great rest of your day.

If you want to view this story in your browser, click here .

— Philip Nussel, online editor

Column: Weird how Jack Hollis' abrupt departure won't faze Toyota

High-profile Toyota executive Jack Hollis' abrupt retirement from the company where he has worked for 33 years is unlikely to faze the automaker or its dealers, and that's different from most of the rest of the industry.

READ MORE >

Ram joins Jeep in the Super Bowl

There will be more than one automotive Super Bowl ad this year after all. Stellantis announced that Ram will run a commercial, in addition to its Jeep brand.

The 2026 Lyriq-V, which starts production this year in Spring Hill, Tenn., will start at $79,990 with shipping.

READ MORE >

Faster appraisals and smarter acquisitions, thanks to your new AI assistant.

When it comes to stocking the best-selling vehicles for your market, leave the manual research and timely calculations in the past. There's a better – and faster – way to bring clarity to your inventory with Avery from AutoVision.

Meet Avery >

Live updates from the NADA Show in New Orleans: Snowfall pushes schedules back, but event goes on

News as it happens from the 2025 NADA Show in New Orleans

The recall affects certain 2021-2023 Bronco Sport and 2022-2023 Maverick pickups.

READ MORE >

Have some news to share? Want to offer your opinion? Please send your feedback to Philip Nussel at pnussel@crain.com

Market close

Winners and losers
Here are the top 5 winners and losers among 65 automotive companies followed by Automotive News on U.S. stock exchanges today.

Top 5 winners

	Yesterday's close	Today's close	Percent change
CarMax Inc.	$78.27	$81.99	4.75%
Carvana Co.	$234.05	$243.12	3.88%
Stoneridge	$5.48	$5.69	3.83%
Credit Acceptance Corp.	$505.29	$524.14	3.73%
Cars Commerce	$17.16	$17.74	3.38%

Top 5 losers

	Yesterday's close	Today's close	Percent change
Canoo	$0.37	$0.33	-11.53%
Workhorse Group Inc.	$0.62	$0.57	-8.57%
Chargepoint Holdings	$0.99	$0.94	-4.46%
Blink Charging Co.	$1.35	$1.29	-4.09%
Polestar	$1.04	$1.02	-1.92%

Quotes from 4 p.m. Jan. 23

Automakers
Here are today's stock trading results from 10 vehicle assembly companies trading on U.S. stock exchanges.

Automakers

	Yesterday's close	Today's close	Percent change
Ford Motor Co.	$10.03	$10.16	1.30%
General Motors	$52.76	$54.22	2.77%
Honda	$28.45	$28.60	0.53%
Lucid	$2.67	$2.72	1.87%
Polestar	$1.04	$1.02	-1.92%
Rivian	$12.69	$12.49	-1.58%
Stellantis	$13.11	$13.24	0.99%
Tesla	$415.11	$412.38	-0.66%
Toyota Motor	$186.52	$186.27	-0.13%
VinFast Auto Ltd.	$4.12	$4.12	0.00%

Quotes from 4 p.m. Jan. 23

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