Beijing — Chinese electric vehicle maker BYD posted an 11.5% rise in third-quarter net profit on Wednesday as it maintained strong sales momentum helped by government trade-in incentives.
Net profit rose to ¥11.6bn ($1.63bn) in the July-September quarter, the company said in a stock exchange filing. For the first nine months, net profit was up 18.1% to ¥25.2bn.
With third-quarter revenue up 24% on year to ¥201.1bn, BYD’s quarterly revenue for the first time outpaced Tesla, the revenue of which for the July-September quarter reached $25.2bn.
Tesla still beat BYD in terms of EV sales globally during July to September.
BYD, the cars of which cars accounted for more than one-third of the total sales of EVs and plug-in hybrids in China this year, smashed monthly sales record in September and its quarterly sales also scaled a fresh high in the third quarter.
The local champion and its peers such as Tesla have enjoyed a tailwind from expanded old-for-new stimulus measures favouring greener cars. Last month, China’s car sales snapped a five-month decline on the subsidy boost, industry data shows.
By late October, 1.57-million applicants had registered to take advantage of a national subsidy of up to more than $2,800 apiece for trading in older cars for greener vehicles, official data shows.
Local governments in China have also been handing out up to ¥20,000 as additional subsidies to EV buyers in schemes to expire at year-end.
BYD had led the growth with aggressive discounts on its best-selling models. Its best quarter was primarily driven by strong growth in plug-in hybrid sales, which jumped 75.6% on the year to 685,830 units in the third quarter, thanks to its latest generation of plug-in hybrid technologies that save more fuel costs for users.
By comparison, BYD’s sales growth of pure EVs (rather than hybrids) slowed to 2.7% to 443,426 units in the quarter. It has been losing share in the EV segment to other EV rivals in China.
BYD, which still sells more than 90% of its cars in China, set a higher annual sales target for this year, a Morgan Stanley report showed in September, and aimed to double exports to 450,000 vehicles this year, a downward revision to the annual overseas shipment goal of 500,000 set in March.
BYD, which has been leading a push into European markets despite facing additional tariffs, sold 94,477 cars overseas in the third quarter, up 32.6% from the year before.
Reuters
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