Chinese electric vehicle makers are taking a ferocious price war to a new level as BYD and its peers kicked off 2024 with dozens of redesigned models that boast improved specifications at lower price tags.
For conventional carmakers, the situation is different from previous stages of the battle, as their Chinese counterparts claimed for the first time that “electric is cheaper than gas,” meaning their EVs now reach or even surpass price parity with similar combustion engine models. This milestone was supposed to take place as early as 2026, according to forecasts from BloombergNEF. Its ahead-of-schedule arrival is ushering a new phase for China’s car industry.
The world’s biggest EV market is being reshaped by a seemingly endless price war that has been going on for a year, and 2024 will likely be a defining moment for those faced with flagging sales, persistent losses, and cash flow pressure, analysts say. The following explainer looks at the causes and implications associated with the recent price cuts by automakers in China, as well as what we might expect in the future.
The good: reduced costs, innovation
Among the key reasons for the price reductions is the plunging cost of raw materials for EV batteries, as the spot price of battery-grade lithium carbonate fell from more than RMB 500,000 ($69,450) per ton to just over RMB 100,000 throughout the last year. Jefferies analysts calculated that Chinese EV makers saw their gross profit margin recover by 2.3% in the third quarter of 2023 with average lithium prices falling by RMB 200,000.
A vertically integrated supply chain stretching from batteries to chips has also granted EV leaders BYD and Tesla the ability to achieve economies of scale and innovate products rapidly. BYD, which has had strong “pricing power” especially in the price segment between RMB 100,000 and RMB 200,000, will embrace a proactive approach to competition, chairman Wang Chuanfu told investors during an earnings call last March (our translation).
Analysts expect the downward trend in lithium prices to continue, as vast amounts of capital were poured into new mines in China following the price rise in 2022, resulting in a severely imbalanced market. Lithium prices could come in as low as RMB 90,000 a ton in the fourth quarter of this year, creating more room for most companies to make price adjustments, Jefferies strategists said in a Jan. 10 note. Meanwhile, EV makers such as Xpeng Motors are likely to improve vehicle margins “to some extent” thanks to innovations in fields such as automated driving.
The bad: overcapacity, slowing growth
On the other hand, however, Chinese EV makers have been under pressure to boost sales volumes as they grapple with a clear capacity glut and slowing growth against the backdrop of weak momentum and insufficient demand.
Only 20 out of 77 car manufacturers in China ran at more than 60% of their maximum operating capacity last year with numbers from the rest coming in under industry-competitive levels, according to public records. Tina Zhou, chief executive of auto parts trading platform Gasgoo, commented on social media on Dec. 17, citing this overcapacity as a major reason for the industry-wide price war over the past year. In January, the Chinese government said it would take “forceful measures to prevent superfluous projects” related to EV manufacturing, Reuters reported.
Although China’s leadership in EV is seen as a bright spot in a faltering global economy and amid a domestic economic downturn, experts have painted a picture of a resilient but slowing market, flagging more price cuts to come as sluggish consumption abounds. Bernstein expects China’s EV sales growth to be “still impressive” but slower at 25% for 2024 compared to 35% last year, with a combined total of approximately 185 new EV models set to go on sale this year.
“Consumers are getting spoiled by deep discounts and believe they will eventually negotiate a better price even for those new cars coming to the market,” Bernstein analysts wrote in a Jan. 10 note.
Could it get ugly?
The unprecedented battle for the world’s biggest and most competitive EV market has pressured international auto majors from Ford to Toyota to scale back their operations since last year, with their market share (Tesla excluded) declining from 51.6% to 38.3% during 2021-2023. Citic Securities on Feb. 22 forecast (in Chinese) that number to drop to below 20% over the long term, with only German luxury carmakers able to maintain their presence.
Meanwhile, a new wave of consolidation and some reshuffling is underway among Chinese EV makers as repeated price cuts allow the bigger ones to grab more market share and put their smaller rivals under financial pressure. The top 10 players could together claim a combined 85% of the market in 2024, driving smaller players out of business, Changan Automobile chairman Zhu Huarong, a delegate of the National People’s Congress, told Chinese reporters on Tuesday on the sidelines of the Two Sessions meetings in Beijing.
Not everyone agrees. NIO founder and chief executive William Li told TechNode during a media event in December that the company is preparing for a long drawn-out fight, while UBS envisioned China could be big enough to allow 10-12 domestic carmakers to sell significant volumes with different success stories by 2030 in the best-case scenario.
Either way, it could be an almighty battle – it will be thrilling to see who emerges victorious.