Core view
With the rising cost, the price of new energy vehicles began to rise. Affected by factors such as rising raw material prices and declining subsidies, nearly 20 new energy vehicle enterprises have announced price increases since March, involving nearly 40 models. The price rise of new energy vehicles will indeed curb demand, but the negative effect of price rise on demand is partially offset by the rapid growth of downstream demand. From the perspective of the price increase range of new energy models of automobile enterprises, due to the large battery capacity of pure electric vehicles, the price increase range of pure electric models is higher than that of hybrid models; The cost of battery self-produced car enterprises is lower than that of battery purchasing car enterprises. We believe that in the case of high price of battery raw materials, the vehicle enterprises that layout battery production will have more competitive advantages. It is suggested to focus on Byd Company Limited(002594) .
The impact of subsidy decline on the cost of new energy vehicles is expected. In 2022, the subsidy standard for new energy vehicles will decline by 30% on the basis of 2021. Vehicles licensed after December 31, 2022 will no longer be subsidized. After the decline of central and local purchase subsidies, the actual cost of new energy models in various car enterprises generally increased by more than 2000 yuan to 3000 yuan. We believe that the decline of new energy subsidies has been prevented in terms of policy, and the subsidy standard and withdrawal time in 2022 have been clarified. The market has long expected the decline of new energy subsidies. At the same time, the new energy vehicle market has shifted from policy driven to market driven, and the decline of subsidies has a limited impact on the overall market growth of new energy vehicles.
The rising price of raw materials is the key to affecting the cost of new energy vehicles. In the cost composition of new energy vehicles, the battery cost accounts for about 40%, and the battery cost has a significant impact on the price of electric vehicles. Due to the rising prices of core raw materials of batteries such as cobalt, lithium and nickel, and the rising cost of batteries, new energy vehicle manufacturers Byd Company Limited(002594) , Tesla and other auto enterprises have raised prices to continuously transmit the rising cost of core components such as batteries to the downstream and transfer the cost pressure. From the perspective of supply-demand relationship at this stage, the development cycle of upstream resources is long, the growth rate of downstream demand is fast, and the supply and demand of lithium resources is obviously unbalanced. It is expected that the contradiction between supply and demand of lithium battery raw materials will be difficult to alleviate in the short term. In terms of lithium carbonate consumption, 1kwh power battery needs 0.6 to 0.8kg lithium carbonate, and the price of lithium carbonate has soared from 50000 yuan / ton in January 2021 to 510000 yuan / ton now. We simply calculate the cost of a 60kwh battery pack, and the cost is expected to rise by about 16560 yuan – 22080 yuan.
Under the strong market demand, the tension between supply and demand of raw materials will continue. China is the world’s largest lithium consumer, accounting for 54% of the world’s lithium consumption, while 70% of the upstream raw materials of lithium salt depend on imports, and the supply gap of the industry exists for a long time. In the case of shortage of lithium ore supply and mainly relying on imported ore from Australia, the utilization rate of lithium carbonate capacity in China is low, only about 50%. The high demand for lithium battery materials from downstream power batteries has led to the supply of power batteries temporarily or unable to match the rhythm of enterprise scale expansion. The newly built capacity in 2021 cannot be released quickly due to long construction cycle, technical constraints and other factors. It is expected that the capacity climbing will be completed by 2023, and the supply shortage will be alleviated until 2024 or 2025.
