In March, because of the rise in the price of battery raw materials, car companies have issued price increase notices, but there are always a few exceptions, such as Weilai Automobile said that there is no intention of price increase, and Ideal Automobile has not announced a price increase notice.
On March 21, there were media reports that for the question of whether Weilai Automobile would increase prices, Weilai Automobile said, "Price stability is good for the interests of users and the market, and we have no intention of increasing prices in the short term." At present, the international raw material price, including chip supply and demand, has made the cost of the entire supply chain change greatly compared with before. We will also make flexible decisions based on changes in the objective environment. ”
This sentence literally seems to be information that does not increase prices, but a careful reading is actually quite subtle, to be flexible according to the market environment, to know that in the current market environment, the rise in raw material prices is not little by little, but a big step, then Weilai Automobile's price increase can persist until when?
What is the current market environment?
Overall, I think it can be summed up in three words: lacking, rising, and difficult!
Everyone knows that the current price increase of new energy vehicle companies is because of the price increase of raw materials, so what is the reason for the price increase of raw materials, because of lack and scarcity. In fact, many raw materials are produced abroad, first of all, the rapid development of new energy vehicles, so that battery manufacturers and OEMs have greatly increased the demand for raw materials; secondly, the normalization of epidemic prevention, many logistics and transportation need high deposits and inspections, and the time cycle is also lengthened, which will increase the cost of transporting raw materials; and finally, the Russian-Ukrainian war has led to more scarce raw materials, because Russia is a big country that produces raw materials.
Because of the imbalance between supply and demand, the demand is far greater than the supply, which finally presents the intuitive feeling to the user is that in the state of inflation, with the flow of funds beginning to enter the manufacturing industry, the cost of raw materials has shown a rapid upward trend.
The rise of raw materials will lead to a series of butterfly effects, first of all, battery manufacturers are the first to bear the pressure, difficult to survive, when they can not bear it, they will convert part of the pressure to the main engine factory, that is, the battery will carry out a part of the price increase, this time the difficult people will add the main engine factory. Within the controllable range, battery factories and OEMs may be able to digest this problem and will not pass it on to consumers. But the current market environment is obviously not within the controllable range.
Therefore, this wave of price increases is only an inevitable trend under inflation.
Will the ideal and WEIlai increase prices?
In fact, there is no definite answer, or it depends on when the price increase of raw materials passes.
After all, even Ideal and Weilai are not sure if the price will rise. Weilai only said that it will not rise in the near future, but it will change flexibly according to the market environment. Ideal Auto also told First Electric that the company will make unified arrangements, and if there is news, it will be released to the public.
It is worth mentioning that on March 20, Li Xiang, founder of Ideal Auto, said on Weibo: "At present, brands that have contracted with battery manufacturers to determine the price increase in the second quarter have basically announced price increases immediately." If there is no price increase, most of them have not yet been negotiated, and the price will generally increase immediately after waiting for the negotiation. The increase in battery costs in the second quarter was very outrageous. War, politics, and the epidemic have made it possible to appreciate the value of buying a car, and the price of used cars in the United States has increased by 30% overall. ”
This wave of operations is considered a harbinger of an ideal ONE price increase.
Finally, here we would like to remind everyone that according to the car purchase subsidy plan previously released by Weilai, users who pick up cars after March 31 will no longer be able to buy cars according to the 2021 national subsidy standards. That is to say, the friends who began to pick up the car in April have to spend more money on their cars.