“Tesla tends to be aggressive in exports regardless of the domestic market in July,” PCA Secretary General Cui Dongshu said during a briefing Tuesday. “The fact that Tesla’s domestic deliveries didn’t reach 10,000 is normal and fine.”
Tesla itself said that besides Europe, its China-made cars are being exported to Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and Hong Kong.
Tesla last month launched a cheaper version of its locally built Model Y crossover, a move that might have spurred some customers to delay their purchase until that particular variant is available. Deliveries of the model are expected to start in the coming months.
The so-called standard-range version will start from 276,000 yuan ($42,600) after government subsidies, about 20 percent less than the original longer-range Model Y. The automaker then cut the price of its basic Model 3 by 15,000 yuan to 235,900 yuan.
The launch of a cheaper Model Y and the price cut for the Model 3 will “for sure attract more internal combustion engine car owners to embrace the electric vehicles,” Tesla China said in a statement Tuesday.
By comparison, Nio’s ES6 electric crossover starts from around 358,000 yuan and Li Auto’s Li One sells for 338,000 yuan. While Tesla still leads the luxury EV market, its Chinese rivals are catching up with stylish designs, localized software and meticulous customer care.
“We think current demand for Tesla is fine in China, but that Tesla has over/forward built capacity relative to the U.S., which is triggering price cuts and exports,” Bernstein analysts led by Toni Sacconaghi said in a report Monday. Domestic competition is “likely to make it difficult for Tesla to fully capture its fair share or sustain similar levels of profitability.”
Overall, retail sales of cars, SUVs and multipurpose vehicles declined by 6.4 percent in July from a year earlier to 1.52 million units, PCA data showed Tuesday. New-energy vehicle sales, which include electric cars and plug-in hybrids, increased almost 170 percent from a year earlier to 222,000, led by strong showings from BYD, Tesla and SAIC Corp.
Cui also said that he expects the global chip shortage to start to ease after next month.
“The national antitrust probe into semiconductors led by the state authorities will intimidate some chip distributors and they will release the inventory they were hoarding, which will further benefit production and sales,” he said, referencing a government probe into possible price manipulation that was announced last week.
