Written by / Han Ling, Wei Shuai, Zhou Mengting
Edited / Mao Shiyang
On February 13, the Ningde era focused on countering various rumors with a "solemn statement". In this statement, CATL said that the recent network platform has been sanctioned by the United States, excluded from the ChiNext weight index, and a series of malicious rumors such as "talking about collapse" with Tesla, which have triggered market misunderstandings and distortions, affecting the reputation of the company, saying that "rumors are nothing wrong and have no basis", so CATL has reported to the public security organs on February 12 and will pursue legal responsibility for rumor-mongers.
On February 14, CATL filed a lawsuit against Hive Energy and its two affiliates, which are also power battery suppliers, on the grounds of "unfair competition", and the case is expected to be heard on February 23.
"We are currently actively responding to the lawsuit." For the prosecution of the Ningde era, a person in charge of Hive Energy told caijing tianxia weekly. Because the news of the indictment and the news of the CATL alarm came successively, the outside world made associations and magnified the attention of the incident, but the reason why Hive Energy was sued by the CATL era was actually a "non-compete agreement dispute".
CATL believes that after leaving their jobs, a number of CATL employees joined Wuxi Tianhong and Baoding Yixin to provide services for the rival Honeycomb Energy of CATL. But in addition, as to whether the prosecution is related to the "alarm door" of the Ningde era, the person in charge said that he was "unaware".
"The timing of the news is too coincidental." Wang Hui, a head of a waist power battery company that was also sued by CATL, told Caijing Tianxia Weekly that the unfair competition dispute case between CATL and Hive Energy and other related disputes began in early May last year, and it was suddenly concerned after the "alarm door".
In fact, the outside world has also talked about the way the Ningde era handled "rumors", but for the "King of Ning", it is more than that.
The "anxiety moment" of the first stock of the ChiNext board
The past week may have been a rare moment of anxiety for Zeng Yuqun, chairman of the Ningde era. As of the close of trading on February 14, the total market value of CATL was about 1.18 trillion yuan, which was more than 300 billion yuan evaporated compared with the peak moment more than two months ago.
It is worth noting that most of these evaporated market capitalizations occurred last week. In the 5 trading days from February 7 to February 11, the "one brother" of the ChiNext board, Ningde Era, made an unfavorable start, the stock price fell by 17.34% in one week, and the total market value evaporated by nearly 240 billion yuan in a single week.
CATL, the company with the largest market value of the ChiNext board and the second only to Moutai in the A stock market, has fallen by 5.59% in the past week due to the sharp decline in its stock price.
The strange thing is that at the same time as the stock price fell in the Ningde era, a series of "bad news" struck.
On February 10, when the stock price of CATL had just fallen below 500 yuan per share, Wei Zhichao, chief economist of Capital Securities, released an article entitled "How long can caterer era fall?" The research report of "A Quantitative Analysis Perspective" analyzes the future trend of the stock price of the Ningde era from the perspective of short-term market sentiment, and believes that the adjustment of the Ningde era may not be over.
Not only the report, Beijing Capital Securities was originally scheduled to hold a conference call at 8 p.m. on February 11, and the theme was still "How much can the Ningde era fall?" A quantitative analysis perspective", the keynote speaker is also the chief economist of Capital Securities Wei Zhichao, known as the "Ningde Bearish Roadshow". But amid the huge controversy, the call was temporarily canceled. The report is now hard to find, but its conclusion is still in the news, that is, the Ningde era may still have 20% downside in the future.
Immediately after the market on February 11, there were rumors that the Ningde era would be "excluded" from the ChiNext weight index. Rumors say that this is because the equity of catheter times and others is too heavy, "kidnapping" the ChiNext index.
At the same time, a picture of a so-called "blockbuster" news on February 11 , "Catalonia era and Tesla price talks collapsed" was widely circulated among investors. Subsequently, it was reported that Tesla had negotiated a purchase order for 204,000 units/year blade battery (model C112F) from ATD's Fordy Battery, and the mass production time was in March this year.
In fact, the news in the market about BYD's order for Tesla began to come out as early as August 2021, but this time, the news came out again and was associated with "Ning Wang". Rumor has it that BYD "grabbed" the order of the Ningde era.
For the above news, BYD officially declined to disclose more. However, these messages, reflected in the secondary market, directly affect investor sentiment.
Who is selling the NINGD era? Wind data shows that northbound funds continued to reduce their holdings in CATL in the five trading days from February 7 to February 11, with a net selling amount of 1.988 billion yuan. Judging from the detailed data, this week's northbound funds have 4 trading days to reduce the ningde era, of which the amount of position reduction on February 11 exceeded 1.2 billion yuan. Margin data shows that on February 10, the financing balance of CATL was 7.826 billion yuan, and the financing balance in the past 10 trading days decreased by 431 million yuan.
Such a dense collection of sensitive information, accompanied by institutional reductions and stock prices falling, even the "King of Ning" can't sit still. Because before that, on November 15, 2021, CATL issued a fixed increase announcement that it intended to raise an amount of 45 billion yuan, when its stock price was at its peak, the fixed increase plan can be described as full of confidence.
"This series of rumors and events will definitely have an impact on the Ningde era fixed increase plan, and it will affect the confidence of investors." A securities analyst in the automotive industry told Caijing Weekly that "the collapse of the stock price may also affect the amount of money it raises." ”
Who was the "enemy" of the Ningde era?
In fact, there are not a few battery companies that have been sued by the CATL era. In addition to Hive Energy, CATL has also filed lawsuits against the company Tafir New Energy and China New Aviation (formerly known as AVIC Lithium Battery). Among them, Hive Energy is a subsidiary of the automobile manufacturer Great Wall, and Wei Jianjun, chairman of Great Wall Motors, is a director of the company, which is regarded by the outside world as an important strategic support for the new energy vehicles of the Great Wall.
Although the Great Wall Euler is still using the battery of the Ningde era, as of the first half of last year, Hive Energy has been able to provide more than 40% of the power battery for the Great Wall. Since the second half of last year, Hive Energy has also intensively announced a number of expansion projects.
"Ningde (Ningde era) shot at the enterprises behind the main engine factory." Wang Hui told Caijing Tianxia Weekly that in his view, the cooperation between OEMs and suppliers is often strong, and the Ningde era is one of the few exceptions.
Behind this, the battery cost accounts for nearly 40% of the cost of a pure tram, and the Ningde era holds the core resources, and many new car manufacturers need to find ways to stabilize the supply relationship with the Ningde era at the beginning of their establishment.
In 2021, with an annual installed capacity of 96.7 GWh, CATL once again became the champion of power battery installed capacity, with a worldwide market share of 32.6%. With the rise of new energy vehicles, the Ningde era has been pushed to the altar and become the leader of global power battery suppliers.
Because of this, CATL is not a low-key supplier, or even a reverse investment in car companies. In November last year, CATL successively invested in Changan's Avita Technology and Nezha Automobile, and before that, it also invested in new energy vehicle companies such as Extreme Kr Automobile, Aiways Automobile and Beiqi Blue Valley.
But in contrast, car companies prefer to have the right to speak. In addition to BYD and Great Wall, Volkswagen spent 8.7 billion yuan last year to hold 26.47% of the equity of Guoxuan Hi-Tech, becoming its largest shareholder. Statistics show that last year, Guoxuan Hi-Tech installed capacity ranked fourth in China, second only to Ningde Times, BYD and AVIC Lithium Battery.
At the end of 2020, GAC Capital, a subsidiary of GAC Group, successfully participated in the PRE-A round financing of AVIC lithium batteries, and in the first half of 2021, 80% of GAC's orders came from AVIC lithium batteries.
It is worth noting that the domestic installed capacity in the Ningde era reached 80.51GWh, accounting for nearly 90% of the total business. To some extent, it can be said that the prosperity of domestic new energy vehicles has supported the trillion valuation of the Ningde era.
Before 2019, the customers of the Ningde era were mainly traditional OEMs and bus manufacturers, and after 2020, the new forces of car manufacturing rose, and they began to become the head customers of the Ningde era, such as Tesla and "Wei Xiaoli" and other car manufacturers. Statistics from the Soochow Securities Research Institute show that after the domestic Tesla, one accounted for 24% of the shipments of the Ningde era in the first quarter of 2021, in addition, Weilai accounted for 14%, and Xiaopeng accounted for 7%.
However, this "faithful" partnership is now beginning to change. Not only are they accustomed to the strong traditional OEMs, after the "new car" has gained a firm foothold, some car companies have begun to look for new battery suppliers to weaken the dilemma of being "stuck neck" in the Ningde era.
Starting from 2020, Xiaopeng began to purchase Ewell lithium batteries. In the middle of last year, 36Kr reported that Zeng Yuqun of CATL also had a dispute with He Xiaopeng in the headquarters building of CATL, and the reason for the quarrel was that He Xiaopeng intended to introduce AVIC lithium battery as the new main battery supplier of Xiaopeng Automobile. Although the two sides denied that the incident had occurred afterwards, just recently, Xiaopeng's response to the introduction of new battery suppliers has changed to "the supply chain of parts for vehicle production needs to be continuously improved in order to better guarantee supply and production and predict the delivery cycle more accurately." ”
Not only Xiaopeng, Weilai's battery supplier has always been the Ningde era, but in January 2021, Weilai launched a semi-solid-state battery pack with a capacity of 150 kWh of electricity, and the supplier is Weilan New Energy. This is the first time that WEILAI has introduced a second battery supplier since its cooperation with CATL. In the ranking of installed capacity in the Ningde era, WEILAI is the second largest passenger car customer after Tesla.
At present, tesla Model 3 standard endurance upgrade version and July 2021 launched Model Y standard endurance version model is the Use of Lithium Iron Phosphate Battery in the Ningde Era, the two sides following the signing of the agreement in February 2020 the latter became a supplier of Tesla, in June 2021, signed a supply agreement again, CATL Times will supply power batteries for Tesla until 2025.
The "Hidden Worries" of the Ningde Era
On the one hand, car companies have expanded their choices, on the other hand, external competitors have also begun to increase the market share of the Ningde era.
At a previous LG New Energy public offering, LG New Energy CEO Kwon Young-soo had said that the future goal is to surpass the Ningde era, saying that the two companies "will soon be on an equal footing."
The data shows that in 2021, the installed capacity of LG new energy's power battery is 60.2GWh, and the market share is 20.3%. Although LG New Energy has a large difference with the Ningde era in terms of installed capacity, in terms of revenue, LG new energy has long been higher than that of Ningde era. In 2020, LG New Energy achieved revenue of 12.4 trillion won (about 66.1 billion yuan), compared with 50.3 billion yuan in CATL. Until the third quarter of last year, the revenue of CATL grew to 73.3 billion yuan, surpassing LG New Energy.
Among domestic battery manufacturers, BYD has always been the number one enemy in the Ningde era. Since the release of blade batteries in 2020, BYD has announced that it will be open for sale to all brands like other battery packs. In 2021, BYD's installed capacity was 26.3GWh, slightly ahead of the 167.13% of the Ningde era with a year-on-year growth rate of 168.37%.
In fact, like car companies, institutional investors were also "friends" of the Ningde era. In the new energy market, the Ningde era is hot. Listed in 2018, in just three years, ningde era has grown into a trillion yuan market value of the "king of Ning". This is inseparable from the "blessing" of capital. According to wind statistics, as of the end of the third quarter of 2021, catalist era replaced Guizhou Moutai as the first stock of the fund, which was heavily held by 1171 funds.
However, the challenges at the business level of the CATL era also extend to the capital level.
In 2021, power batteries began to enter a period of rapid growth. According to mainstream research institutions such as Bloomberg New Energy Finance, the rapid growth of power battery demand will continue until 2030, when the demand for power batteries will increase by more than 20 times compared with the current level. Therefore, some research institutions believe that the challengers of the Ningde era will get development opportunities.
Stimulated by the huge increment, capital began to intensively provide funds for power battery companies. In September 2021, AVIC Lithium Battery completed an equity financing of 12 billion yuan, and Hive Energy also completed a total of 16 billion yuan in the same year.
These trends are eventually transmitted to the secondary market. Although the current stock price of CATL has fallen, its dynamic price-earnings ratio still reaches more than 118 times, and the static price-earnings ratio exceeds 200 times. Excessive valuations mean that capital markets are demanding more. Some institutions believe that high valuation means that the risk is larger and the opportunity to obtain the expected benefit is small, and the funds need to switch tracks to obtain greater benefits.
"In the past two years, the Ningde era has relied more on capital and finance to expand the scale, and it is insufficient in its own product innovation." Auto analyst Zhang Xiang also told Caijing Tianxia Weekly, "The sodium-ion battery it launched is not mass-produced now." Competitors BYD launched blade batteries and GAC launched clip batteries, which made the Ningde era face disadvantages in the future development. ”
However, at the same time, some institutions believe that the Ningde era, as the industry leader, has strong funds, long-term cost advantages, and technical material resources are not dependent on North America, the profit resistance is extremely strong, backed by China's huge domestic demand market, the future leading position will continue to consolidate.
In the eyes of more industry insiders, whether it is the current trend of the capital market or the action of automobile manufacturers, it is only a round of the previous excessive "dependence" on it, and for the Ningde era, it just needs more time to deal with these relationships.
(Wang Hui is a pseudonym in the text)
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