Nissan makes a drastic move to save itself from financial ruin | Official Website of Louis Velazquez, entrepreneur, finance guy and tech innovator

Ever since they were announced on April 2, President Trump’s tariffs cast a new shadow over many industries that rely on imports for their businesses.

One of those industries is automotive, where a large proportion of cars are made using imported parts, or assembled outside the United States.

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While certain automakers lean heavily on U.S. manufacturing, no car is made 100% in the U.S. Tesla has the highest percentage of domestic content, with 87.5% in both the Model Y and Model 3, but even these cars will suffer the burden of tariffs.

The situation presents major problems for companies. They must find a way to solve them on a very short timeline, and depending on their financial situation, it may be impossible for them to recover.

Nissan may be one of these companies, as it’s grappled with its finances for some time. The 92-year-old automaker posted a loss of $4.5 billion in 2024. A proposed merger with Honda could have saved the company, but fell apart in late 2024 after Nissan refused to make the changes Honda was asking for to ink the deal.

Now Nissan is planning a new move to try to keep itself from falling apart — and it’s one of the things it told Honda less than a year prior it would not do.

Economic trouble is brewing for Nissan.

Image source&colon; NurPhoto/Getty Images

Nissan’s plans for recovery

Since Nissan posted its enormous loss for last year, the automotive company has been making sweeping changes to cut costs wherever it can.

That includes significant cuts to its workforce, which the company announced in May 2025. The total affected is 15%, or roughly 20,000 employees. This layoff includes the 9,000 head count reduction announced last year and will be executed through March 2028.

Nissan also announced it would close seven of its 17 factories, which comes on top of the news earlier in the year of canceled plans for a new battery plant in Japan.

The company has also made cuts to its plans for new vehicles. It announced in April it would scrap plans to build two electric sedan models, and that same month also said it would slash production of its popular Rogue by 13,000 units.

Nissan’s recovery plan includes trying to reduce costs by $3.4 billion, and a new report details a drastic move the company is planning to help achieve that goal.

Nissan mapping out a major move

Nissan is considering selling its headquarters in Yokohama, Japan, per a new report from Nikkei Asia.

The building appears on a list of assets Nissan plans to sell by the end of March 2026 and has an estimated worth of 100 billion yen ($698 million U.S.). While not explicitly stated, it is possible that Nissan would continue to lease the property from the buyer rather than relocate the headquarters.

Selling its own headquarters seems like a desperate move for the legendary car company, but according to comments from a senior official at the company, it may not have much time left.

As Nissan executes its plan to turn the situation around, it’s also seeking a long-term, steady shareholder to help it shoulder a load that may be too heavy to carry on its own, per a report from The Financial Times.

“We have 12 or 14 months to survive,” a senior official close to Nissan told the publication.

Former Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn commented on Nissan’s situation in early May, saying that the company’s situation was predictable “as early as 2020,” and that decisions were made too slowly. He also said that “most of the problems lie with Nissan’s management.”