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Trump reportedly says he wants to wipe German cars off the U.S. map

BERLIN/FRANKFURT — A report that U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to pursue German carmakers until there are no Mercedes-Benz rolling down New York's Fifth Avenue dented shares in the luxury car manufacturers on Thursday. An excerpt from German magazine Wirtschaftswoche's article, which cited several unnamed European and U.S. diplomats but did not include any direct quotes, could not be independently verified, while a U.S. Embassy spokesman in Berlin referred questions to Washington. The news and current affairs magazine said Trump had told French President Emmanuel Macron in April that he aimed to push German carmakers out of the United States altogether. Macron's administration in Paris declined to comment on the report. The Trump administration last week opened a so-called Section 232 trade investigation into vehicle imports, which could result in a 25 percent tariff on cars on the same "national security" grounds Washington used to impose metals duties in March. This could destroy exports by German carmakers, which control 90 percent of the U.S. premium market and are the biggest European Union exporters of cars to the United States. BMW owns Rolls-Royce, while Daimler has Mercedes-Benz, and Volkswagen controls Bentley, Bugatti, Porsche and Audi. Daimler, BMW and Audi declined comment. Porsche was not immediately available for comment. BMW shares were trading 0.5 percent lower at 0939 GMT, while Daimler and VW's shares were down 1 percent and 1.6 percent respectively, underperforming Germany's blue-chip DAX. Trump has railed against German carmakers before. And in early 2017, in an interview with German newspaper Bild, he said he would impose 35 percent tariffs on imported cars. At the time, the president called Germany a great car producer but said that the business relationship with the United States was an unfair one-way street. Germany's auto industry association VDA says its members exported 657,000 vehicles to North America last year, with total exports of vehicle components, cars, engines, as well as second-hand vehicles totaling 31.2 billion euros in 2016. Imports from the United States to Germany amounted to 7.4 billion euros, meaning a trade deficit of 23.8 billion euros the VDA's latest available figures show. However, German brands also have huge factories in the United States, where they built 804,000 cars last year, VDA said, providing jobs for U.S. workers. Berlin has reacted angrily to the U.S.

Bugatti by Venet is the world's fastest art

Some consider the Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Grand Sport to be a piece of rolling art, while others consider the real masterpiece to be the engineering feats to be what lies underneath. Impressively, French artist Bernar Venet has managed to combine these two notions in one dramatic special edition model: the Bugatti Veyron Grand Sport Venet.
Venet, whose works can be found everywhere from New Zealand to Versailles, confessed that he initially thought it unnecessary to alter what he already considered a work of art. The French painter and sculptor drew inspiration from Bugatti's engineering equations that led to the development of the Veyron. The numbers and functions were placed on the bodywork in such away that it appears they are being blown off the Grand Sport as it drives at speed. These equations are also stitched into the interior, and the finishing touches come in small replicas of Vanet's works on the oil cap, filler cap and the center console.
The Bugatti Grand Sport Venet will be on display at the Rubell Family collection during Art Basel Miami Beach, which runs through December 9. Check out the video below to see Venet discuss creating this high-speed work of art, surrounded by his own works.

Bugatti Veyron La Finale gets a video farewell

It's still amazing to think that the Bugatti Veyron project is finally over. Even today, 10 years after the start of production, the car is an engineering marvel. And while Bugatti waved farewell to the supercar at the 2015 Geneva Motor Show with the Grand Sport Vitesse La Finale, it promised a successor was on the way. Before we get to the next Bugatti, though, the brand will milk La Finale for as much news as it can get. The upshot is a peek into Bugatti's sci-fi workshop with a video that chronicles the final build of La Finale. Obviously a performance powerhouse, even the way the Veyron comes together looks unlike any other automobile. The shop has a massive wall of windows, and the metal columns to hold the assemblies can disappear into the floor when not in use. The clip also shows the supercar's rear structure unadorned with the carbon fiber body. The mass of tubes and wires demonstrates just how complicated the W-16 engine really is. This is a wonderful way to bid adieu to the last of a legend.