A $208 million grant from the Biden administration to Volvo Holdings that is intended to enable the company to keep 3 American facilities from shutting down is directly benefiting a Chinese Communist Party senior member, auto industry magnate Li Shufu, whose firm holds $2.4 billion worth of stock in the company.
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Excerpt from freebeacon.com
Chinese billionaire and auto industry magnate Li Shufu is a senior Chinese Communist Party member who has explicitly devoted his career to spreading Chinese influence worldwide. According to data reviewed by the Washington Free Beacon, he is also set to personally benefit from the Biden-Harris administration’s latest taxpayer-funded initiative to boost electric vehicle manufacturing.
Li’s firm, Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, holds a $2.4 billion stake in heavy-duty vehicle manufacturer Volvo Group, making the Chinese firm the company’s second-largest shareholder. The Volvo Group is set to receive a $208.2 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy that will help keep some of the truckmaker’s factories afloat.
Geely’s stake is entirely made up of class-A shares, which are more exclusive and confer much greater voting power. In total, Geely has a 15 percent share of voting power, giving it sway in the Volvo Group’s corporate decisions, such as electing board members or initiating mergers.
The value of that stake has surged 5.3 percent, or $119 million, since the morning of July 11, when the Biden-Harris administration announced the grant, which is designed to support the Volvo Group’s transition to electric truck manufacturing across three facilities in Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Maryland.
The Energy Department’s grant was earmarked under a new federal program designed to support “shuttered or at-risk auto manufacturing and assembly facilities.” The designation suggests that, without the funding, the Volvo Group’s three facilities may have been forced to close.
