We have already talked at length about how bad some manufacturers are going to have it with the strict emissions regulations in Europe. Those that exceed the 93.6 g/km average among all their cars sold in 2025 face multimillion-dollar fines. It is a significant jump compared to the 115.1 g/km that was in force in 2024 and that was already driving some brands upside down. Now we get the news that Tesla could pocket more than 1,000 million euros by the emissions of others.
Is fruit of carbon credits obtained by manufacturers who are below emissions. Tesla, by selling only electric vehicles, has millions of these credits and does not hesitate to do business with them. It sells them to other brands that are exceeding emissions and facing fines. Clearly, it is better for them to buy credits from Tesla or others to pay the fineswhich amount to 95 euros for each gram exceeded, multiplied by the cars sold. It is a very lucrative business for those who can carry it out.
According to documents published by the European Union, there have been five manufacturers that have turned to Tesla to avoid sanctions. Toyota, Stellantis, Ford, Mazda and Subaru They are the ones who are going to pool their emissions with those of Elon Musk’s firm in exchange for a huge amount of money. There is talk that the transaction could be around 1,000 million euros, although in previous years we have already seen that that figure has been exceeded. The most surprising thing is the entry of Stellantis into this group.
When Carlos Tavares was still in charge, they talked about complying with the regulations organically and without aid. It seems that sales of their electric vehicles have not yet taken off enough to achieve this and they have had to turn to a third party. There are still doubts, since other greats like Volkswagen and Renault seem to be passing emissions and they will have to make some alliance in this area to skip them.
For example, Mercedes has turned to Volvowhich has margin thanks to the good sales of the EX30 and what Polestar brings to it. In fact, they could reach up to 300 million euros in compensation this year. Still there is room until the beginning of February for other brands to join these agreements, so we will be attentive in case someone else jumps on the Tesla bandwagon or joins the “Volvo team.”
