On January 17, Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index suffered another adjustment. Hong Kong auto stocks fell again, and NIO and Xpeng Motors still suffered sharp losses. As of midday closing, NIO's share price fell by 9.59%, and Xpeng Motor's share price fell by 8.83%, with share prices at HK$49.05 and HK$39.25 respectively.
Some institutions said that the sharp decline in the stock prices of NIO and Xpeng may be related to Tesla’s previous announcement of price cuts in China. On January 12, Tesla announced domestic price reductions for many models. The price of the refreshed version of Model 3 dropped to 245,900 yuan, the price of the refreshed version of Model Y long-range battery dropped to 299,900 yuan, and the price of Model Y dropped to 258,900 yuan.
Daiwa Securities issued a report stating that Tesla’s price cuts have had a negative impact on the overall atmosphere of the Chinese automobile industry. Due to the oversupply of new energy vehicles this year and intensified competition, the brokerage also expects short-term profit margins in the supply chain of Tesla and other new energy vehicles to be under pressure.
Among the affected car companies, Xpeng may face the greatest pressure. Since Tesla announced the price cut, Xpeng Motors' stock price has fallen by more than 20% in less than four trading days as of Wednesday's noon close. On the one hand, Tesla Model 3 is a direct competitor of Xpeng Motors P7, and this time Model 3 returns to less than 250,000 yuan, it is bound to have a big impact on Xpeng. In addition, although Xpeng's sales recovered in the second half of last year, its net loss in the third quarter also increased significantly by 63.6% to 3.89 billion yuan compared with the same period in 2022.
In addition to Xiaopeng and Weilai, some institutions have also lowered BYD's target share price. Citigroup analysts have previously lowered BYD's target share price to HK$436, a 23% decrease from the previous price.