Back in October, the EU imposed tariffs against Chinese electric vehicles after the European Commission ruled that China benefits from unfair subsidies following an investigation. These tariffs added additional import costs to EVs on top of the 10-percent duties already in play, making cars up to 35 percent more expensive. According to market data analyst Dataforce, and as reported by Bloomberg, those tariffs appear to be having an impact on Chinese EV sales in Europe, with their market share dropping to its lowest since March. But not all manufacturers were hit equally.
According to the latest numbers, SAIC, the parent of the MG brand, was hit the hardest by the tariffs. The EU tacked on an additional 35.3 percent to imports from the Chinese state-owned automaker — the highest of any brand — which significantly raises the price of a vehicle. MG tallied 3,762 registrations across Europe in November, down 58 percent year over year. Its share of EV registrations in the E.U. dropped to 7.4 percent in November, down from 8.2 percent in October.
Other automakers weren’t affected quite so much. BYD, for instance, was still able to make gains compared to last November, with registrations up 127 percent, to 4,796. That’s despite BYD being hit with an additional 17 percent import tariff. XPeng registrations were up 93 percent to 1,222 registrations — admittedly not a large share of the market. Leapmotor was up 296 percent from a year prior, but that numbered just 404 registrations.
Overall, Chinese automakers registered 11,490 EVs in Europe in November, down 12 percent year over year.