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BEIJING, April 6 (TMTPOST)— China’s electric vehicle (EV) sales maintained robust growth in the start of the year, even as the overall auto industry remained sluggish.

Source: Visual China

In March, the retail sales of passenger vehicles increased 17% month-over-month (MoM) to 1.596 million, roughly flat compared with the same period last year, while sales of passenger vehicles EV gained 5% year-over-year (YoY) to 549,000 units in March, up 27% MoM, China Passenger Car Association (CPCA) estimated on Thursday. There were 4.275 million passenger vehicles sold at retail in the first three months of the year, representing a 13% YoY fall, out of which 1.319 million were EVs, jumping 15% from a year earlier, according to CPCA.

The wholesale volume of passenger vehicles rose 7% YoY to 1.955 million units, bringing the total sales year to date to 5.021 million with a yearly decline of 8%, CPCA data showed. The EV sector delivered much stronger growth as the sales on a wholesale basis soared 32% YoY to 599,000 units, thus the total sales since the beginning of the year increased to 1.483 million units, growing 24% YoY.  

This year saw a relatively stable trend in the global new energy vehicle (NEV) market, including battery electric vehicle and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, with sales in the first two months of 1.5 million, up 24% YoY, CPCA commented. The auto industry body noted China accounted for around 60% of the worldwide EV sales volume in these two months with double-digit growth both in domestic sales and exports, highlighting strength of the NEV industry in the country.

The data came days after Tesla"s Chinese rivals posted their sales in the past month and most of them kept rally from massive slowdown in January.

BYD Co., sold 207,080 NEVs in March with a YoY 97.45% increase and a 6.9% MoM increase. This is the first time for the largest EV manufacturer in China to sell more than 200,000 units since December and sales in March were about 28,000 units less than the record it set in December. As of that month, BYD shattered new monthly sales record for the tenth straight month and managed to sell more than 200,000 units for four months in a row. The company recorded a 62.44% YoY increase in sales in January, cooling from the triple-digit monthly growth through the year 2022. In the first two months of this year, BYD notched more than 40% of share in China’s NEVs, up from 34% last year, while Tesla’s market share down to 7.8%.

Aion, a brand owned by the state-owned manufacturer Guangzhou Automobile Group Co., Ltd. (GAC), said its sales in March rose 97% YoY to 40,016 units, for the first time topping 40,000 vehicles, and sales up 33% from a month ago. With total sales of 80,308 vehicles from Jan. to March, Aion remained the champion among China’s homegrown EV startups, though the 79% YoY growth in recent quarter fell short of its annual growth record of 126% in 2022.

Li Auto delivered 20,823 vehicles with YoY growth of 89% and MoM growth of 25%. Delivery in the first quarter of the year reached 52,600 units, up 66% from the same quarter last year. NIO Inc announced delivery in March edged 3.9% higher to 10,378 units, but falling 14.6% from previous month. Its quarterly delivery climbed 20.5% YoY to 31,000 units. Xpeng Inc is still a laggard compared with peers. The automaker delivered 7,002 vehicles with more than 54% yearly decline. However, the 17% MoM growth was slightly stronger than the monthly increase of 15% in February.