In 2021, the new energy automobile industry has experienced a changing development process.
By the end of the year, the new energy vehicle sales market was particularly lively, and many car companies swept away the haze of the epidemic and the order volume rose sharply. Some new energy vehicle brand dealers said that the recent flow of people to the store to see the car has increased significantly, and the sales indicators have basically exceeded the quota.
In addition to the emergence of this situation, which is affected by the factors of the peak sales season at the end of the year, the new energy subsidy policy is also one of the reasons.
In April 2020, the Ministry of Finance issued the Notice on Improving the Financial Subsidy Policy for the Promotion and Application of New Energy Vehicles (hereinafter referred to as the "Notice"), which stipulates that the implementation period of the financial subsidy policy for the promotion and application of new energy vehicles is extended to the end of 2022, and at the same time, for the sake of smoothing the pace of subsidy decline, in principle, the subsidy standards from 2020 to 2022 will be reduced by 10%, 20% and 30% respectively on the basis of the previous year.
After the subsidy declines, the terminal price of vehicles is inevitably affected, and many car companies have announced price increases. FAW-Volkswagen has begun to render the atmosphere of subsidy decline in early December, and on the poster of the countdown to the national subsidy decline released by FAW-Volkswagen, from January 1, 2022, the words of 5400 yuan of new energy state subsidies are very eye-catching. The same theme poster also appeared on Xiaopeng Automobile, Nezha Automobile and other new car-making power brands.
In the sales mouth of some new energy vehicles, seizing the "final window period" has become an important way to urge consumers to place orders as soon as possible.
In fact, in addition to the decline in subsidies, the price increase of new energy vehicles is also affected by the price increase of the upstream supply chain.
Since the beginning of this year, the market for new energy vehicles has soared, and the heat of the core component power battery has continued to increase. Among them, the price of battery-grade lithium carbonate, the main raw material of power batteries, staged a "triple jump" during the year. According to CCTV Finance, as of December 30, the price of lithium carbonate has jumped from 50,000 yuan per ton at the beginning of the year to 274,000 yuan per ton. In December alone, there was a 30% increase, a year-on-year increase of more than 400%, and prices hit a new record.
In the face of subsidy decline and the increase in raw material costs, most new energy vehicle brands have shown a price increase attitude. It is worth noting that at the end of 2020, also facing the decline of subsidies, many brands have chosen to help users bear the cost of subsidies. In one year, the change in the attitude of automobile brands has also hinted to some extent that the new energy vehicle market is on the right track.
Statistics from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (hereinafter referred to as the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers) show that from January to November this year, the cumulative sales of new energy vehicles reached 2.99 million units, an increase of 166.8% year-on-year. From January to November, the cumulative sales penetration rate increased to 12.7%. According to the analysis of the China Automobile Association, the current consumer acceptance of new energy vehicles is getting higher and higher, and the new energy vehicle market has shifted from policy-driven to market-driven.
At present, it seems that the market's confidence in new energy vehicles is increasing, and this information has also been expressed in car companies. Ma Lin, head of corporate communications at Weilai Automobile, told the media that the proportion of subsidies in the price of Weilai models is very low, and Weilai is basically unaffected. Subsidies decline every year, and at this stage, the impact of subsidies on the market is not large.
Tao Lin, global vice president of Tesla, believes that the decline in subsidies does not mean that new energy vehicles lose competitiveness, but will promote a more stable market, and new energy vehicles will truly enter the stage of relying on product strength competition.