By Alex Ho
Hyundai Motor (KS:005380) said it will halt its production in South Korea as the coronavirus crisis has disrupted the company’s part supply.
Despite the news, the company’s shares traded 1.2% higher to 125,500 KRW by 11:20 PM ET (03:20 GMT).
“Hyundai and Kia may be more affected as they tend to import more parts from China than other global automakers,” said Lee Hang-koo, senior researcher at the Korea Institute for Industrial Economics & Trade, in a Reuters report.
Production in Hyundai’s seven factories in South Korea accounts for about 40% of the company’s global output, the article said.
Hyundai, along with other global automakers including Tesla and Honda, have already extended factory closures in China under government guidelines.
European carmakers such as Volkswagen, Audi and BMW remained little impacted by the virus outbreak so far, as they said their factories outside of China were not affected by supply bottlenecks so far.
