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Aston Martin has slashed £300m from its investment plans after the British sportscar maker reported a bigger than expected loss in the third quarter because of Donald Trump’s tariffs and weak demand in China.

The carmaker said on Wednesday that losses before tax were £112m in the third quarter of 2025, a ninefold increase from £12m a year earlier.

The brand, whose products are best known for featuring in the James Bond film franchise, has been buffeted by global pressures during a five-year turnaround effort that has been marked by perennial heavy losses.

Aston Martin had already warned earlier this month that this year’s profits would be lower than previously expected because of a decline in sales. It sold 1,430 cars to retailers during the third quarter of 2025, down 13% compared with the period last year.

Revenues over the first nine months of 2025 were down by 26% to £740m compared with almost £1bn a year earlier.

Adrian Hallmark, Aston Martin’s chief executive, said: “This year has been marked by significant macroeconomic headwinds, particularly the sustained impact of US tariffs and weak demand in China.

“Work is under way to review our future product cycle plan with the aim of optimising costs and capital investment while continuing to deliver innovative, class-leading products to meet customer demands and regulatory requirements.”

The manufacturer, which produces its vehicles in Warwickshire and south Wales, has already delayed the launch of its first electric model, and it cut 5% of its workforce in February. It said it would detail further changes early next year.

Aston delivered the first of its Valhalla supercars this month, which it hopes will improve the financial performance if it can deliver 150 in the last three months of the year. The company will make 999 of the mid-engined, plug-in hybrid cars, priced at £850,000 – or more than $1m a vehicle. Aston Martin said that more than half of the cars were already ordered by customers.

The company has been under the ownership of a group of investors led by the Canadian fashion tycoon Lawrence Stroll since early 2020. Stroll, who made his money through fashion brands including Michael Kors, hoped to make Aston Martin into a luxury brand to rival Italy’s Ferrari but immediately was forced to confront the crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

Since then, Aston Martin has been forced to go through a painful process of reducing the number of cars held by dealers, before production issues and weak Chinese demand cause a sales slump. Then Trump came along.

The US president imposed a 25% tariff on automobile imports on 3 April, on top of an existing 2.5% levy, causing chaos in the global car industry and adding a huge cost to Aston Martin’s cars in one of its key markets.

Demand in China also remained “extremely subdued”, Aston Martin said, because of economic weakness and the imposition of a “luxury car tariff” on more cars from the end of July.

Stroll said that 2025 had brought “several unexpected challenges” but added that his confidence in the long-term future for the brand was “unwavering”.

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Operating profit has slumped at German carmaker Mercedes-Benz driven by the cost of restructuring, weak demand in China, US tariffs and provisions for potential car finance mis-selling in the UK.

In the period between July and September, the group recorded profit before interest and tax of €750mn, a 70 per cent decline on the same period the previous year. But the company maintained its full-year guidance and shares rose 6 per cent at the start of trading on Wednesday.

The profit fall was influenced by the cost of a major restructuring programme launched this year. Workforce cuts in Germany and restructuring overseas cost €876mn in the quarter, the company said.

Mercedes-Benz also made new provisions of a “mid-three-digit million euro amount” to cover the cost of claims related to potential car finance mis-selling in the UK. The British financial regulator the FCA this month presented a draft scheme redress scheme for customers affected.

The unadjusted operating profit figure was below analyst estimates compiled by Visible Alpha, which had expected EBIT of €1.5bn.

Mercedes-Benz has struggled with falling sales in China, where domestic carmakers have been winning market share from European rivals. The company’s global unit sales fell 12 per cent year on year in the third quarter, led by a 27 per cent drop in China.

The carmaker said that US tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump had also hit its profits in the third quarter, as had fluctuations in the exchange rate. Mercedes’s unit sales in the US fell 17 per cent in the quarter.

Sales in Europe have been more robust, increasing by 2 per cent in the third quarter.

Overall, the group reported revenues of €32.1bn in the third quarter, a decline of 6.9 per cent on the same period last year.

Battery-powered vehicles made up 21.8 per cent of its sales in the third quarter, a rise fuelled partly by the launch of new all-electric models.

Chief executive Ola Källenius said in a statement that the company remained “focused on enhancing customer experience while driving efficiency across our company”.