Kia is crushing it in America, and sidestepping tariffs — for now

Korean automaker Kia (000270.KS), is killing it.

Kia America, part of the Hyundia Motor Group, reported another record sales month in February, powered by its mix of gas powered offerings like the high-selling Telluride SUV, as well as EV vehicles like the EV6 crossover.

“So our grand strategy is, first, we want to be a leader in what we call sustainable mobility. This is key, is mission, and EVs are part of that, and also includes electrified internal combustion, which is hybrids and plug in hybrids and so on,” Steven Center, Kia Americas COO & EVP told Yahoo Finance. “But we we’ve also built out a very full lineup of internal combustion vehicles in the past few years.”

Center mentions the aforementioned three-row Telluride, as well as the Sorrento and other smaller SUVs. The company didn’t abandon sedans — like its Big Three rivals did — and just introduced the midsize K4 last year. The larger K5 is actually built in North America.

A big part of the growth plans for Kia include localizing production in the US, which it has done for many years. Kia intends to move its EV production stateside as well.

“We’re going to be building EVs in Georgia, and that’s before any of this tariff talk. Kia has been in the United States for over 30 years now, and we’ve invested as a company, billions and billions and billions of dollars in American manufacturing and supply chain,” Center said. “So this is part of a plan we’ve had for a long time.”

Officially, Kia addressed the 800-pound gorilla in the room —Trump’s auto tariffs — by stating the company is monitoring tariff developments and will be reviewing business strategies in response.

But — and this is a big but — the White House hasn’t targeted vehicles made in South Korea, where Kia is based and still imports vehicles in the US.

Ford CEO Jim Farley has been howling that not targeting other international imports with tariffs is unfair because international automakers like Kia are essentially getting a free ride, whereas imports from Mexico and Canada — also part of a free trade agreement — are slated for 25% duties starting April 2.

Unfair or not, it’s likely only a matter of time before other trade partners are targeted by the administration, and Center believes Kia has a good game plan if that happens, because of its large US footprint.

“[Tariffs] will affect every brand differently depending on their balance of what they make where. So in our case, and we’ve had plenty of meetings about this in the past few months, we’ve got our business plan, and we’re going to continue to work that plan to the best advantage of our customers, our dealers — who are also customers who have big investments in Kia — and to hit the volume levels, we want to keep growing [in the US].”