EV Discussion thread

JKenH

ABrass said:

Aren't EV sales volumes still up 40% on last year? And the incentives are being reduced everywhere except the US?

Yes, or something like that. It is more the rate of increase has slowed. Sales in the UK, year to date, have averaged around 16% of the market, which I think is similar to the back end of last year. In the first half of last year, manufacturers were trying to catch up with demand because of the chip crisis but since then supply has edged ahead of demand. 

ABrass

You might be getting confused by market share Vs volumes. As you say last year there was limited supply of cars and the market has more supply this year. That's true for ICE as well as BEV.

BEVs are up 40% on last year, however the rest of the market grew almost 19%. So the share of the market for BEVs has gone from 14% to 'only' 16% instead of 19.6%.

JKenH

ABrass said:

You might be getting confused by market share Vs volumes. As you say last year there was limited supply of cars and the market has more supply this year. That's true for ICE as well as BEV.

BEVs are up 40% on last year, however the rest of the market grew almost 19%. So the share of the market for BEVs has gone from 14% to 'only' 16% instead of 19.6%.

No, not confused. I agreed that volumes were up. In response to your comment that EV volumes were up 40%, I said “yes or something like that”. I then commented that “ Sales in the UK, year to date, have averaged around 16% of the market, which I think is similar to the back end of last year.” What I was saying there was that sales as a proportion of the market were similar to the end of 2022. These are the figures below. You could say petrol car sales had grown faster than BEV sales if you felt so inclined - up 70k compared to 63k BEV. Market share is what matters. 

Edit: BEV market share as a whole was 16.6% for the whole of 2022 - about where we are now in 2023.

Edit 2: This graph from ZapMap shows the pattern more clearly

JKenH

ABrass said:

Aren't EV sales volumes still up 40% on last year? And the incentives are being reduced everywhere except the US?

Right now EVs are still expensive compared to ICE. With the inflation we've seen it would be surprising if they didn't suffer more. But when inflation stops being such a problem they will rebound again, except by then the fundamental cost will be lower.

I think I had replied, or started my reply to you before your edit. In response to your comment regarding inflation, manufacturers had responded with some cracking EV discounts to boost September sales. For example a Vauxhall Corse-e was available under £20k and there was a third off the list price of old model Audi e-Trons. See my post linked below
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6367380/ev-discussion-thread/p196

As far as incentives go the main driver for UK EV sales was the BiK tax benefit and this hadn’t changed since 2021. 

ABrass

You need strong discounts to make a Corsa E compete with an MG ZS4.

EV sales are driven by price now. We are no longer in a state where if you built it you will sell it. That means energy hogs like the Audi or overpriced Corsas struggle whilst MGs fly off the shelves.

We've just started to see BYD bring it's UK operations online. That's going to be a huge change in the next few years.

Martyn1981

ABrass said:

Aren't EV sales volumes still up 40% on last year? And the incentives are being reduced everywhere except the US?

Right now EVs are still expensive compared to ICE. With the inflation we've seen it would be surprising if they didn't suffer more. But when inflation stops being such a problem they will rebound again, except by then the fundamental cost will be lower.

And we are still in the early days, which I often forget, given that Nissan had the Leaf at one end of the market in 2011, and Tesla, the S at the other end in 2012. Been an eventful decade, with the next promising even more drama, especially as ICEV sales fall.

Legacy are now struggling somewhat with the transition, and Japan must be very nervous, having given China such a huge headstart.

JKenH

Despite rising sales (as backlog orders are filled) both VW and Ford are reporting falling demand for their EVs. 

Ford’s EV losses continue piling up in Q3 amid pricing pressure, UAW strike

Ford sold 20,962 EVs in Q3, edging out Rival General Motors. The growth was thanks to rising Mustang Mach-E output.

Although Mach-E sales were down 20% through the first half of the year, Ford said it was due to a revamp at its plant in Mexico, where the model is built.

Mach-E sales rose 42.5% in the third quarter, with 14,842 units sold. The Mach-E set a new record with 5,872 models sold in September alone.

Meanwhile, sales of Ford’s electric pickup fell 46% in the quarter. 

In the third quarter, Ford’s electric vehicle shipments increased by 44%. The higher volume contributed to Ford’s Model e unit’s revenue growing 26% YOY to $1.8 billion.

Despite higher volume, Ford’s EV losses continued to pile up in Q3. Ford posted an operating loss of $1.3 billion, up from $1.1 billion in Q3. Ford’s operating margins fell to -75.6% in the quarter from -58.9% in Q2. The company expects a full-year loss of $4.5 billion for its EV unit.

Ford announced last quarter it would be pushing back its 600,000 EV run rate goal until next year, citing EV demand will be slower than expected.

Meanwhile VW says orders for its electric models are down 50% in Europe

Volkswagen says EV orders are down 50% in Europe

After releasing its results for the first nine months of the year, Volkswagen’s CFO said EV orders are down 50% in Europe. VW’s order intake fell short, attributed to a slowdown in the overall market.

The Volkswagen Group announced Thursday that EV deliveries increased by 45% YOY, reaching 531,500 in the first nine months of the year.

VW’s EV sales share stood at 9% in the third quarter for a total of 7.9% through September. The company said it remains on track to hit its (previously lowered) annual target of 8-10%.

Europe was Volkswagen’s biggest EV market, accounting for over 341,000 electric models (+61%) sold through September. China, the automaker’s biggest market in terms of profits, was next with 117,100 models sold (+4%). EV deliveries in the US rose 74% to 50,300.

JKenH

Hertz pulls back on EV plans citing Tesla price cuts, high repair costs

• The rental car company cited Tesla’s price cuts negatively impacting the resale value of its EVs, and higher than expected repair costs for EVs as a reason to slow its pace of electrification.
• Hertz now has 35,000 Tesla vehicles and around 50,000 electric vehicles in its fleet -- far shy of the 100,000 Teslas that Hertz originally said it was ordering and expected by the end of 2022.

“Our focus and our work with Tesla is to look at the performance of the car so as to lower the risk of incidents of damage,” Scherr said. “And we’re in very direct engagement with them on parts procurement and labor and the like.”

As Hertz buys up more EVs from GM and other automakers down the line, Scherr said on the company’s Q3 call, the company expects those electric vehicles to have a “lower incidence of damage,” and “a lower cost of parts and labor.”

“Remember, in the likes of GM and other OEMs, there’s decades of establishment of a broad national parts supply network. There’s an aftermarket of parts that that is there that is less mature obviously in the context of Tesla,” Scherr said, adding that margins and other EV issues would improve as Hertz looks to “diversify” that part of its fleet.

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/10/26/hertz-pulls-back-on-ev-plans-citing-tesla-price-cuts-repair-costs.html

michaels

Lots of questions:
Are the problems with the Teslas predominantly accidents or unreliability?
Do they have more accidents or do the repairs take longer (expensive for a hire business) and/or cost more?
Is the repair cost the bigger issue or the retained value?  (I understand that generally rental companies get deep discounts off list for their big purchases which obviously help when it comes to minimising depreciation but suspect they did not get such a deal from Tesla?)

Netexporter

I reckon the lack of an indicator stalk is going to cause some accidents. (or at least misidentification of Teslas as Beemers/Audis)