Chinese electric vehicle market hit by new tariff pressure

BYD is a publicly listed Chinese manufacturing multinational based in Shenzhen, China. Credit: Shutterstock/TY Lim.

New tariffs introduced on 5 July raised duties on Chinese-made EVs to as high as 48% and now automakers are struggling to adjust.

Chinese automakers registered fewer electric cars across Europe in July and European EV battery importers are experiencing issues bringing parts into the EU.

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Brands including SAIC Motor Corp’s MG and BYD accounted for 9.9% of EV registrations in the region, down from 10.2% in July 2023.

The decline in EVs being registered echoes a broader slump in EV sales.

Provisional levies have stoked trade tensions and led to retaliatory probes as China recently announced that it has found evidence of the dumping of brandy from the EU, with the EU’s EV duties set to become permanent in November.

Chinese companies overall registered fewer than 14,000 EVs across Europe in July, down from more than 23,000 in June, and a 9.7% decline from July 2023.

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Incentives, or lack thereof, continue to play a dominant role in EV sales; for example, in Germany, EV sales declined 37% in July and are now down 20% year-to-date after Germany removed incentives late last year.

However, in Belgium and Denmark, where EV incentives remain in place, demand for battery-powered cars continued to grow.

Matthias Schmidt, an independent auto analyst based in Germany, says Chinese carmakers rushed to beat the tariff deadline, which left them with fewer EVs to sell in July.

Automakers SAIC Motos pressed more than 13,000 electric MGs into the hands of European dealers during June, ahead of the tariff deadline.

BYD Auto, another Chinese EV company, doubled its European presence in July from a year earlier, although China’s biggest carmaker posted a 5.5% sequential drop.

The company is building plants in Hungary and Turkey that, once operating, will allow it to sidestep the new tariffs.

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