Don’t write off Chinese electric vehicle stocks just yet.
After most of the major ones, including XPeng (XPEV), Li Auto (LI), and Nio (NIO) were crushed, they’re all showing big signs of life today. All thanks to earnings expectations, deliveries, and news the China Passenger Car Association expects to see EV sales reach 600,000 for November, which would represent 58.5% growth year over year, and 8% month over month.
Better, “Historically, car sales in China have picked up strongly in the year-end months,” Deutsche Bank analyst Edison Yu said, as quoted by Investor’s Business Daily. He expects new models, including the Nio ET5 and Li L8 and L9, to boost November sales.
Let’s start with a look at XPEV.
Also, while XPEV met earnings expectations, it missed on sales, and watched its stock soar anyway. You see, while sales missed expectations, they were still up 19% on a 15% jump in vehicle deliveries for the quarter. Its gross profit margin was 13.5%, which was down year over year, but was still the strongest profit margin produced by XPEV in 2022.
Moving forward, the company expects to deliver between 20,000 and 21,000 vehicles in the fourth quarter. While that’s less than the expected 25,000, “President Brian Gu says November deliveries will come in similar to the 5,101 units delivered in October. That means December deliveries should top 10,000 again,” as noted by Barron’s.
The worst may also be over for Nio.
2022 was a disaster for NIO. But it’s coming back strong. According to Deutsche Bank analyst Edison Yu, the worst may be over. For one, he believes the Chinese government will gradually shift from its zero COVID policy. Two, he believes delivery numbers will start to show improvement with December’s report. From the looks of it, most of the bad news has been priced in, including all of the analyst downgrades and lowered price targets.
Li Auto is up 17% today, too.
Not only is LI running with NIO and XPEV, it’s running on buy ratings. DBS Bank, for example, just initiated a buy rating with a price target of $29. Jefferies also initiated a buy rating with a $20.66 price target. The firm also called LI its “favorite NEV startup” and that concerns about the cannibalization between L9 and L8 are overdone, as noted by TheFly.com.