Author 丨 Dao Zong
The source丨 Dao always makes sense
The fuel money saved for a year was finally wasted at the end of the year, which is the voice of most electric vehicle owners in 2022, and it is well known that the premium of new energy vehicle insurance rose and fell like a roller coaster at the end of last month, cruelly affecting the nerve endings of car owners.
The premium of new energy vehicles has always been higher than that of fuel vehicles, and with the launch of new energy exclusive car insurance at the end of December, the premiums of major popular brand models have fluctuated again. For example, Tesla's premium increase is the highest, four of the five models have increased their premiums by more than 80%, and among domestic brands, the three brothers of car manufacturing, Weilai, Ideal and Xiaopeng, have increased their premiums by 8% to 37% according to different models.
Specifically, car owners are also complaining on the Internet. There are Tesla owners in the group posted tesla Model3 P official website premium, the original 8,000 yuan or so, a few days of difference, the official website price became 18,000 yuan.
In fact, the policy cost of new energy vehicles has always been not low, maintenance costs and insurance rates are the original sin, there are data that show that the loss rate of new energy vehicles is generally above 85%, and Tesla's loss rate can be as high as 1:1.4. This price increase has made a group of car owners want to cry without tears, but not all the premiums of new energy vehicles are rising, and the total premiums of several cars of BYD and Roewe are declining.
Some car owners joke that buying car insurance is like buying stocks, and the "metaphysics" in it is elusive, but in fact, it is not the owner who really wants to cry, but the insurance company.
Insurance companies cannot afford new energy vehicles
Buying a new energy tram is equivalent to serving a "daddy", this self-deprecating way has long been strange, if the endurance and fuel saving cost can also be offset by two or two, then the white eyes and indifference encountered in the claim process can definitely write an electric vehicle "chronicle", even if it is an insurance personnel who are born with a brilliant tongue, most of them can't say anything when they encounter new energy vehicles.
On the one hand, the entire insurance industry has little experience in contracting new energy vehicles, and the traditional auto insurance model cannot be directly grafted into the new energy industry. According to public information, the number of new energy vehicles underwritten in 2017 was 1.717 million, and the number of vehicles in 2019 was only 3.47 million, only 1.4% of the total number of insured cars in the industry.
The Society of Automotive Engineers of China predicts that by 2030, the number of domestic new energy vehicles can reach 80 million, at the same time, the scale of related premiums will be as high as 470 billion yuan, but this figure is not worth mentioning in front of the entire auto insurance market, after all, there are still ten years before 2030, the domestic auto insurance premium income has reached 818.9 billion, accounting for 63% of the total premiums of the property insurance industry.
On the other hand, the high risk rate of new energy vehicles is no secret. According to China Bancassurance data, from 2016 to the first half of 2020, the overall insurance frequency of new energy vehicles was 3.6% higher than that of non-new energy vehicles, the insurance rate of new energy vehicles for household vehicles was even higher than that of non-new energy vehicles by 9.3%, and the average compensation of household new energy models was higher than that of non-new energy vehicles by 2.7%.
Further, the depreciation rate and maintenance cost of new energy vehicles are also much higher than those of traditional fuel vehicles. It is reported that the depreciation rate of fuel vehicles is generally 0.6% per month, and the hybrid vehicle is 0.63% per month, while pure electric vehicles are subdivided according to different price points, 0.68% above 30W; 0.72% of 20-30W; 0.77% of 10-20W; 0.77% below 10W or even 0.82% per month.
This wave of new energy vehicle premium increases is directly related to the "three electricity" in exclusive car insurance, traditional fuel vehicles only have 11 additional insurance, while electric vehicles have 13 additional insurance, with batteries, motors and electronic controls included in the insurance regulations, the three parts of the highest cost of new energy vehicles have greatly stimulated the rise in premiums.
In the past, it was possible to rip off and not lose, but now the compensation is a foregone conclusion. According to the survey, the average battery replacement price of more than 30% of new energy vehicles in a year is between 65,000 yuan and 125,000 yuan, and the average battery replacement price is 30, and the average replacement price of batteries is 30, and the annual proportion of the car is 30%. Taking the Tesla Model 3 as an example, the cost of replacing the battery is about 100,000, which is almost equivalent to one-third of the price of the whole vehicle.
The maintenance cost of the motor is not low, and the statistical data of Jingex Lianxun shows that the average replacement price of the motor each year is the highest proportion of 0.7 million yuan to 14,000 yuan, the proportion of the car year is more than 40%, and the average replacement price of the motor is more than 18,000 yuan.
As for why the premiums of some models do not rise but fall, in fact, the three insurances of new energy vehicles and the benchmark premium of car damage insurance have declined as a whole, of which the benchmark premium of the three insurances has dropped by 0.1%, the benchmark premium of car damage insurance has dropped by 1.2%, and ping An Property & Casualty's data shows that 80% of the benchmark premiums of new energy vehicle owners will decline. In particular, new energy vehicles priced at less than 250,000 yuan do not increase fees for car damage insurance, and the threshold for limiting the increase and decrease in rates is also narrowing.
Of course, there is also a clear trend that almost all models can not rise Tesla, and every owner who complains about the increase in premiums can be instantly relieved when he meets Tesla owner. Tesla is the "ten thousand people" at the door of insurance companies, and the US "Consumer Report" data shows that tesla ranks second from the bottom in the 2021 car reliability ranking, only higher than Lincoln.
Secondly, tesla accessories prices are surprisingly high, taking Tesla Model 3 and Weilai ES6 as an example, the two in the "mainstream accident accessories price list", the difference between the headlights is more than 3,000, the difference between side guards is more than 5,000, and the difference in sunroof glass is nearly 4,000. For insurance companies, new energy vehicle contracting is more like a "thankless" business, due to the large number of integrated parts, any bump behind it is tens of thousands of claims.
In terms of loss ratio, the current loss rate of new energy vehicle insurance generally exceeds 85%, and small and medium-sized enterprises have a comprehensive cost ratio of more than 110% because of poor pricing power, and even the head company can only barely maintain breakeven. Nowadays, insurance companies have finally survived to the price increase in premiums, but in the face of those electric dads who are full of "treasure", they can't laugh.
Car companies grab food, insurance companies "worse"?
The insurance industry's "foresight" for new energy vehicles dates back nine years. As early as 2013, insurance companies such as Chinese Insurance, Chinese Life and Ping An Property & Casualty Insurance began to try new energy vehicle insurance, but later for various reasons did not successfully land, these years, insurance companies love and hate the new energy vehicle insurance business.
In the first quarter of 2021, PICC P&C and Ping An P&C's auto insurance premium income was RMB57.503 billion and RMB42.638 billion, respectively, with growth rates of -6.7% and -8.9% respectively. It is reported that the loss of Ping An Auto Insurance this year is as high as 300 million, of which the loss of new energy vehicles is the largest. However, in the face of more and more new energy vehicles on the road, it is too much of a pity to give up, and many insurance companies are hard to face the owners of new energy vehicles.
In the first half of 2021, PICC Property & Casualty Insurance New Energy Vehicle Premium Income reached 4.03 billion yuan, the average premium of vehicles was 3900 yuan, and the number of insurances was 1.03 million units, saying that it was disgusted, but the body had to get closer to the entire new energy automobile industry, but there was an indisputable fact that new energy vehicle companies could not help but salivate at this increasingly fat business.
It is reported that due to the data analysis of the US Highway Loss Data Research Institute, Tesla's Model S and Model X models claim frequency and cost are extremely high, resulting in the US car insurance provider once increased Tesla's premium by 30%. Musk launched his car insurance business in California three years ago and made a high-profile claim that premiums are 30% cheaper than insurers.
In recent years, Tesla's series of actions on car insurance do not look like a joke. During the third quarter of 2019 conference call, Musk planned to increase the value of the insurance business to 30% to 40% of the value of the vehicle business. By the third quarter of 2020, the financial report data showed that the main business income of "maintenance and insurance expenses" was 12 billion US dollars.
Not only that, in October 2021, Musk also said at a shareholder meeting in Texas that Tesla's internal insurance plan will be officially launched soon. It is worth mentioning that in August 2020, Tesla also registered insurance business-related companies in China, and the legal person shown by Tianyancha is the person in charge of Tesla's Greater China region.
There is more than one Tesla that "supports itself" in terms of insurance. In 2018, BYD officially said that it plans to launch a "personalized pricing insurance service", and in July of the same year, Xiaopeng Automobile established Xiaopeng Automobile Insurance Agency Co., Ltd.
What is more interesting is that the Ningde era, as one of the biggest beneficiaries of the new energy market, has also heard about it later. In 2021, CATL invested in Xiaokang Life with a 30% stake, and then signed a strategic cooperation framework agreement with Chinese Insurance Property & Casualty Insurance. You know, according to the research data of the E-Car Research Institute, in the first three quarters of 2021, among China's auto insurance users, the proportion of willingness to buy car companies' direct auto insurance business is as high as 66.44%.
However, seeing that car companies are menacing, it is difficult to say whether they can get a piece of the pie, car companies want to operate their own insurance business is not from the field of new energy, as early as 2004, SAIC Group set up relevant insurance companies, in 2006, GAC Group followed, after 2011, FAW Group, Changan Automobile, Dongfeng Motor and BAIC Group have also followed suit.
But nearly two decades from 2004 to the present do not seem to have understood this cross-border business. Although insurance companies are trembling, there are countless problems that car companies face when entering car insurance, such as the license plates and contracts that bear the brunt of them, and the dynamic management that cannot be ignored in the future.
Car companies are bold, which is a warning for the insurance industry, even if the warning has not been fully sounded now.
Why is the scene getting worse and worse?
Paying car insurance every once in a while seems to be a fixed consumption item in daily life, but the economic return value of car insurance is often in an instant. In the past two years, natural disasters have from time to time dealt a dimensionality reduction blow to the entire insurance industry, and at the same time, it has further confirmed the importance of automobile insurance.
In 2019, Typhoon "Lichma" crossed the border, according to the statistics of the Insurance Association, as of the end of 2019, the total compensation expenditure of the industry was as high as 4.031 billion yuan, of which car insurance accounted for 44%, 137,900 pieces, and the compensation expenditure was 1.791 billion yuan. In 2021, the Henan flood occurred, and the Henan insurance industry received nearly 200,000 insurance claims, of which car insurance accounted for about 95%, involving more than 100,000 vehicles.
It is undeniable that motor vehicle insurance has always been the largest business in the field of property insurance, especially before 2015, with the per capita car ownership continues to rise, the car insurance market is expanding day by day, but unfortunately the good times are not long, especially in the past two years, and the proportion of car insurance in the property insurance market is not as good as before.
In 2019, China's auto insurance insured motor vehicles reached 260 million times, an increase of only 1.96% year-on-year, and the growth rate fell by at least 7 percentage points. From 2015 to 2020, the proportion of China's auto insurance premium income to property insurance premium income continued to decline, from 77.54% to 66.76%.
I have to admit that the proportion is still more than half, but the scene can not escape the embarrassment, even the Internet car insurance that has boiled for a while is not strong for a few points. Data from the China Insurance Industry Association shows that in 2020, the development of the Internet car insurance business slowed down and the overall decline, the business is in a state of continuous negative growth, in the first half of 2020, a total of 42 companies to carry out Internet car insurance business, the cumulative premium income totaled 11.172 billion yuan, a year-on-year negative growth of 24.34%.
Specifically, the car insurance business of major insurance giants also confirmed this point, in the first half of 2021, the Chinese car insurance business reached 47.54 million vehicles, and the Chinese car insurance premium income was 120.755 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 7.8%; the profit was 3.925 billion, down 40.8% year-on-year.
It can be said that the car insurance market began to shrink in anticipation, first, domestic car sales have slowed down quite seriously in recent years, the most brutal one in 2019, when new car sales fell by 10.97%, setting a record for the lowest round. The second is the recovery of the second-hand car market, in the first quarter of 2021, the transaction volume of China's second-hand car market in the first quarter was nearly 4 million, reaching nearly 250 billion yuan.
Because the change in car ownership relationships will not only not stimulate the car insurance industry, but will also eat away at the new car market, resulting in weak premium growth. The trade-offs of the old and new markets are destined to lay the groundwork for the future fate of the auto insurance industry.
Frankly speaking, auto insurance is not easy to do, whether it is a new energy vehicle that cannot afford to lose, or a traditional fuel vehicle, mainly because there are too many participants in this industrial chain. In addition to the clear supply side and demand side, that is, property and casualty insurance companies and car insurance users, the interests that cannot be seen on the surface are complex, such as the channel side, the regulatory end, the risk control end, the service end... Suck up the dividends in minutes.
Taking the channel side as an example, the insurance companies that provide car insurance account for about 50% of the business from the direct exhibition industry, and a large part of the remaining comes from insurance intermediaries, including professional distribution agencies and part-time distribution agencies, the former is divided into insurance brokerage companies and agency companies, and the latter is mainly 4S shops and repair shops.
The profit brought by the auto insurance business is far lower than ordinary people's cognition, and the operating profit margin of Ping An's auto insurance business in 2020 is only about 1%, and the UBI auto insurance business leader Progressive Insurance Company in the United States will only be about 8% in 2020. New energy vehicles are booming, but unfortunately they still can't save a desolate car insurance market.