Chinese Tesla challenger NIO posts best quarter on record EV deliveries, helping narrow losses and crush analysts’ estimates

The Shanghai-based carmaker’s first-quarter sales jumped more than fivefold to 7.98 billion yuan (US$1.23 billion), while its net loss narrowed to 354.5 million yuan, or 0.23 yuan per share, under Chinese accounting rules. That’s better than the loss of 16 US cents per share expected in a poll by Investors’ Business Daily.

Including a one-time loss of 4.4 billion yuan spent buying a 3.3 per cent stake from minority shareholders in its NIO China unit, the group’s loss widened to 4.88 billion yuan during the quarter, under general accounting rules, it said in a New York Stock Exchange filing.

“This will be the year for China’s leading smart electric vehicle companies to chalk up stellar gains,” said David Zhang, an analyst at North China University of Technology. “NIO and its Chinese counterparts are set to benefit from a rising penetration of electric cars although they are still lagging behind Tesla.”

NIO, along with Xpeng and Li Auto, are the most aggressive challengers to Tesla in China, but their sales make up only a small portion of the deliveries by the US carmaker, seen as the bellwether of the industry. Tesla delivered 35,478 electric cars from its Gigafactory 3 in Shanghai in March alone, more than double what its three Chinese rivals sold together.