In another bullish point for lithium, copper, nickel and all those other green metals, Chinese new electric vehicle sales (or NEVS, New Energy Vehicles) continued at high levels in July.
Preliminary industry data on Tuesday showed that sales of battery powered NEVS showed little impact from tax cuts aimed at helping maintain sales of conventionally powered internal combustion engine driven cars.
Figures from the China Passenger Car Association on Tuesday showed wholesale sales (to dealers and distributors) of NEV passenger vehicles fell slightly to 564,000 units in July – up 129.3% increase from 246,000 units in July, 2021 but a small, 1.23% fall from 571,000 units in June.
Battery electric vehicles (BEVs) accounted for the vast majority of NEV wholesale sales in July, accounting for 428,000 units or 76% of the total. Plug-in hybrid vehicles (PHEVs) accounted for 136,000 units of wholesale sales in July.
In terms of retail sales, China’s new energy passenger vehicle actual sales reached 486,000 units last month, up 117.3% year-on-year but down 8.5% from June.
From January to July, China’s wholesale sales of new energy passenger vehicles were 3.03 million units, up 123% year on year. That’s on track to easily top the 5 million industry forecast for all of 2022.
Retail sales of new energy passenger vehicles in China from January to July totalled 2,733 million units, up 121.5% from the same period of 2021.
For July total retail sales of passenger cars rose 20.4% from a year earlier to 1.82 million vehicles, down 6.5% from June as heat waves and Covid linked disruptions kept some consumers away from showrooms.
Wholesale sales of all vehicles in China were 2.13 million units in July, up 40.8% ear-on-year and down 2.5% from June.
July saw the purchase tax on internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles cut in half to 10% to 5% but that didn’t impact NEV sales.
Tesla sold 28,217 Chinese-made cars in July.
In retail sales, the penetration rate of NEVs in July was 26.7%, down slightly from 27.4% in June. Final data on all vehicle sales for July will be released tomorrow (Thursday).
