Luke Vargas

VW's plans could soon be tested in federal court as dealers seek class-action status for suits that could force Scout to rethink its sales model.

U.S.

state laws broadly guarantee that only independent dealers, not manufacturers, can sell vehicles to consumers.

And that's it for What's News for this Monday morning.

Today's show was produced by Hattie Moyer and Daniel Bach.

Our supervising producer is Sandra Kilhoff.

And I'm Luke Vargas for The Wall Street Journal.

We will be back tonight with a new show.

Until then, thanks for listening.

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Here is your Morning Brief for Thursday, March 5th.

I'm Luke Vargas for The Wall Street Journal.

China has cut its annual economic growth target to a range of four and a half to five percent, the lowest expansion goal since 1991.

The new target kicks off the next five-year plan for the world's second-largest economy.

With Chinese household spending and investment slowing down, China's growth in recent years has been fueled by exports.

But the new plan suggests that Beijing wants to dial down trade tensions and rely less on export-driven growth and instead focus on technological self-reliance, including through its cutting-edge AI, EV, and robotics industries.

A federal trade court judge has ruled that the Trump administration is on the hook for more than $130 billion in tariff refunds.

The judge grew impatient when a Justice Department lawyer said that the government hadn't formalized its position on refunding tariffs and said that issuing refunds would be time-consuming.

The ruling comes as more than 2,000 companies have filed lawsuits seeking to claw back money they've paid in duties, including Costco and FedEx.

And Morgan Stanley is laying off 2,500 employees, or around 3% of its global workforce.