Since entering March, nearly 20 new energy vehicle companies have announced price increases, involving nearly 40 models, with an increase of 3,000 to tens of thousands of yuan. After understanding the rising environment of the market, we have to go to the reasons behind it, after all, the price increase is the appearance, and the reason is worth our deep investigation.
Subsidies decline
To say why the domestic new energy vehicle price increase in 2022 is the most direct reason, then the national subsidy slope should account for a part: on December 31, 2021, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and other four ministries and commissions issued the "Notice on the Promotion and Application of New Energy Vehicles in 2022 Financial Subsidy Policy", the "Notice" clarified that the subsidy standard in 2022 will decline by 30% compared with 2021 (non-public sector), and announced that it will be completely withdrawn after December 31, 2022. Subsidy rules (non-public sector): 1. Pure electric vehicle subsidies between 300 and 400km are 9100 yuan (13000 yuan in 2021). 2. Pure electric vehicle subsidies ≥ 400km for pure electric vehicles are 12,600 yuan (18,000 yuan in 2021). 3. Pure electric mileage ≥ 50km (NEDC working conditions) or ≥43km (WLTC working conditions) plug-in hybrid vehicle subsidies of 4800 yuan (6800 yuan in 2021).
Since after understanding the policy changes, the reasons for the price increase of some brands are also well understood, but some people will say when they see here, no, the subsidy decline should be within the plan, and the car companies should have a more comprehensive plan to deal with, why are they not ready to increase prices in a rush? In fact, in the automotive industry chain, the right to speak of the automaker is often relatively strong, even if the cost is increased, they will be very cautious about the adjustment of the price of the vehicle. That is to say, the national subsidy slope is a high probability that the price will not increase, so why do car companies have increased prices? This brings us to the next reason.
Raw materials soared
Indeed, if only the subsidy is reduced by 30%, for many car companies, it is still within the acceptable range, and it is not a big deal to digest this part of the cost internally. However, at this embarrassing time, the price of raw materials soared, note that it is soaring. According to a data released by Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, a world-renowned battery raw material consulting company, from January 2020 to January 2022 alone, the prices of cobalt, lithium carbonate and nickel sulfate rose by 119%, 569% and 55% respectively, while in ternary material batteries, the cost of cathode materials containing lithium, cobalt, nickel and other metal elements accounted for 50% of the total cost of battery materials.
Maybe this data is not intuitive enough, we take the recent extreme market lithium carbonate as an example, last January, the battery grade lithium carbonate price at about 50,000 yuan a ton, and in March this year, the price of battery-grade lithium carbonate more than 500,000 yuan a ton, doubled 10 times, to average a pure electric vehicle needs to use lithium carbonate 50kg calculation, but the cost of lithium carbonate on the top of the more than 20,000 yuan, which is not counting other raw materials. For a mature industrial chain, in fact, some raw material price increases can actually be digested within the chain, but for this extreme market, it has directly led to the shock of the entire industrial chain, and finally consumers have to buy a part of the order.
Will the price keep going up?
In fact, even if the car companies do not say, everyone knows that this year will increase prices, raw material prices and subsidies to decline this news everyone also knows, Tesla's first price increase, and the price increase is also the largest, Xiaopeng in recent days "with the card" is likely to be unable to withstand the pressure. Whether it is a chip or lithium carbonate, it is a product facing cyclical price fluctuations. From insufficient capacity to overcapacity to insufficient capacity, because of the long adjustment cycle and large capital investment, the contradiction between supply and demand will break out every few years. It is only because the impact of this epidemic is too great and the sales of electric vehicles are growing too fast, and the contradiction is particularly fierce.
However, the automobile is a heavy asset, large-scale industry. Such characteristics determine that its investment and decision-making are to consider the long-term cycle and scale effect. In other words, using price increases to cope with price increases is always the next policy for the automotive industry, and improving the efficiency and scale coordination of the whole industry chain is the eternal cost reduction topic of the automotive industry. That is to say, the small price increase of electric vehicles at this stage is a helpless move to cope with short-term pressure. At present, the technology of lithium extraction in salt lakes is bound to continue to progress in the context of global lithium shortage, thereby expanding the supply source of lithium, according to the analysis of a number of research institutions, this round of lithium ore supply gap, optimistic to 2023 there will be an inflection point.
Write on the back
In recent years, the development speed of new energy vehicles has exceeded many assumptions, according to the data released by the Association of Passenger Vehicles, in February 2022, the penetration rate of new energy vehicles has reached 21.8%, and it is still growing. In this node of lack of core, lack of batteries, and no subsidies, new energy vehicle companies will face a hurdle, whether to rely on technology and scale to pass, or to be tripped by this hurdle, in fact, it is a sign that the entire new energy automobile industry has entered the market, and it is also a sign of the real maturity of the new energy automobile industry.