The latest consolidated data on sales of electric cars in Europe closed the second quarter, give us different conclusions depending on whether we analyze the last three months or so far this year. The most significant thing about the second quarter of the year is that manufacturers such as Tesla, BMW Group, and the Volkswagen Group have fallen in share due to two unconnected events, the massive closure of COVID-19 in China for one, and the war in Ukraine for the second. . That has dragged the market.
Tesla was unable to take advantage of its competitors’ misfortune, losing the Model 3’s top spot as the best-selling electric model since Q4 2020. It was overtaken by Stellantis’ Fiat 500e, which had no supply issues. Another model that overtook Model 3 was the Polestar 2, a Sino-Swedish model that was less affected by the closures in China.
The analyst Matthias Schmidt observed that during the second quarter -with provisional data-, the share of electric cars in the total market fell for the second time in the year, compared to the peak of the last quarter of 2021. The fall in the market for BEV (without plug-in hybrids) is linked to production problems, which translate over time to lower sales. In Q2 the share of electric cars was 12.3% (-0.5% compared to Q1), and he trusts that we will end the year with 14% of the market.
Tesla was able to maintain an 8% market share, a far cry from the 33.9% it achieved in the third quarter of 2019. The Berlin factory is supplying about a quarter of the Model 3 and Model Y sold in Europe. By the way, the latter was the best-selling model of the semester, and despite everything, the Tesla Model 3 was the second. In third place is the Fiat 500e.
During the last quarter, the groups that sold the most electric cars were Volkswagen (67,760), Stellantis (60,560), and Tesla (25,140). The same situation occurs at the semi-annual level, although Stellantis has gained a share while Volkswagen and Tesla have dropped a little. In terms of volume, not a quota, in the first half of the year, 633,200 electric cars have been registered compared to 485,000 units in the first half of 2021. Felipe Muñoz, from JATO, estimates the share of electric cars at 11.4% from January to June.
It is clear that at the moment there is a greater or lesser level of sales of electric cars due to supply reasons, because there is demand, and for several months to come, with some models exceeding six months or a year of waiting. The lack of production is also related to lower sales of thermal models and the market in general. Thus, the market, in general, fell 14% between January and June.
