At least mergers and acquisitions activity is still happening somewhere – among the 16-wheelers. Germany’s MAN is paying €1.18bn for the Brazilian truck and bus operations of Volkswagen (which is its own biggest shareholder, with 29.9 per cent). Days earlier, Daimler agreed to buy 10 per cent of Kamaz, Russia’s biggest truck maker, for $250m.

The push into emerging markets – source of much of the truck industry’s growth in recent years – makes sense. Western European sales are falling, and the previously dynamic central European market is grinding to a halt. So Daimler is betting Russia’s truck market, of which Kamaz has 30 per cent, will become Europe’s biggest – which, even with Russia’s economy slowing sharply, looks a sound long-term assumption.