On December 31, 2021, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Science and Technology, and the National Development and Reform Commission jointly issued the Notice on the Financial Subsidy Policy for the Promotion and Application of New Energy Vehicles in 2022 (hereinafter referred to as the "Notice") and the "2022 New Energy Vehicle Promotion Subsidy Plan" (hereinafter referred to as the "Plan"). The "Notice" requires that in 2022, the subsidy standard for new energy vehicles will be reduced by 30% on the basis of 2021; the subsidy standard will be reduced by 20% on the basis of 2021 for urban buses, road passenger transport, rental (including online car-hailing), sanitation, urban logistics and distribution, postal express, civil aviation airports and vehicles in the official field of party and government organs. At the same time, the Notice clarifies that the subsidy policy for the purchase of new energy vehicles in 2022 will be terminated on December 31, 2022, and vehicles licensed after December 31, 2022 will no longer be subsidized.
As soon as this news came out, the major new energy vehicles have opened a wave of price increases, although the price increase is affected by the transmission factor of raw material costs, but the most important reason is the subsidy refund.
Entering March, according to incomplete statistics, new energy vehicle companies have once again issued price adjustment notices, with mixed increases.
WM Motor corporation announced that starting March 1, the scheduling plan and price of some models will be gradually adjusted. Among them, the EX5-ZPRO all-round version and the Lead Chuangling edition are 3,000 yuan and 4,000 yuan higher than the original price, respectively. On March 19, it was notified again that the price of the models on sale will be adjusted, and the price will be raised by 7,000-26,000 yuan / etc. after the comprehensive subsidy, and this price adjustment will take effect at 00:00 on March 28.
On March 10, Tesla announced that it will implement price adjustments for the Model 3 high-performance version and the ModelY long-endurance and high-performance version, and the price will be raised by 10,000 yuan.
On March 15, Tesla once again announced an increase in the price of four domestic Tues models, ranging from 14,200 yuan to 20,000 yuan.
Late on the night of March 15, BYD issued a note on model price adjustments, raising the official guidance prices for new energy models related to Dynasty and Ocean Network, ranging from 3,000 to 6,000 yuan.
In addition, CAR COMPANIES SUCH ASA, SAIC ROEWE, XIAONIU ELECTRIC, XIAOPENG MOTORS, GEOMETRIC CARS, ZERO-RUN CARS, EULER MOTORS AND OTHER CAR COMPANIES HAVE ALSO ISSUED PRICE ADJUSTMENTS TO EXPLAIN THE PRICE INCREASES.
Power batteries account for about 40% of the total cost of new energy vehicles. The cost of materials accounts for about 85% of power batteries. Among the four major materials, the cathode material accounts for the heaviest proportion, the price of cathode material raw materials in 2021-2022 continues to rise, the industrial chain is under obvious pressure, taking lithium as an example, as of March 18, 2022, the average price of battery-grade lithium carbonate reached 504,000 yuan / ton, an increase of 73.79% over the beginning of 2022, and the average price of battery-grade lithium hydroxide (coarse particles) in 2022 reached 494,000 yuan / ton increased by 123.02% compared with the beginning of 2022.
In addition to the impact of chip shortages and rebates, the bigger reason for the price increase of car companies is that the price of raw materials continues to rise sharply. Terminal cost pressure is obvious, helpless to raise prices to balance the cost pressure, based on the price rise of raw materials, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has also spoken to focus on meeting the production needs of power batteries, moderately accelerate the development progress of domestic lithium, nickel and other resources, crack down on hoarding, price gouging and other unfair competition behavior. At the same time, improve the power battery recycling system, support efficient dismantling, recycling and other technical research, and continuously improve the recycling rate and resource utilization efficiency.
Although the price continues to rise or will inhibit some demand, but in the current situation, the wide range of price increases by car companies has not had a significant impact on the rapidly growing new energy vehicle company market, and the rise in oil prices may further stimulate the market consumption of new energy vehicle companies.