The price of raw materials has skyrocketed, and the industry: new energy vehicles below 200,000, sell one and lose one

Unexpectedly, new energy vehicles are fond of "surging oil prices", but they cannot escape the "periodic table of elements".

Affected by the Russian-Ukrainian conflict and capital operations, the price of nickel metal has skyrocketed recently, once breaking through the $100,000/ton mark.

Nickel prices on the London Metal Exchange (LME) rose 250% in two trading days. Shanghai nickel futures also rose by the daily limit for three consecutive trading days, with increases of 12%, 15%, and 17% from March 7 to 9.

Hearing this news, apart from the first-line "leeks", the most worrying thing is the big men of new energy vehicles.

As we all know, nickel, as the key raw material of ternary lithium battery, the price has been high.

This unexpected price increase, coupled with the previous "phenomenal surge" in chip, lithium and cobalt prices, not only exhausted the cost-resolving ability of the entire new energy vehicle industry chain, but also made it worse for the terminal market.

For car companies, this also raises a lot of questions.

Are new car prices going up? How to go up? Can the "cost-effectiveness" advantage of low-priced electric vehicles be maintained? How to maintain?

With the negative impact of the skyrocketing "demon nickel" fermenting, traditional car companies and new car manufacturers will continue to face the contradiction between cost and the difficulty of adjusting the end market.

(1) The "dilemma" between "price increase" and "blood cutting"

The macro situation will trigger price fluctuations in the short term, but in the final analysis, the price increase expectation of nickel also depends on the relationship between supply and demand.

According to Electric Star, the current global nickel inventory is already very low. Since April last year, the nickel inventory in the LME-registered warehouse has dropped by nearly 70% to 83,328 tons.

Low inventories have exacerbated the price surge, with LME nickel prices up 76% since the start of the year.

The sharp rise in nickel prices has brought about an "explosion" of battery costs.

According to agency estimates, the nickel price has risen from US$20,000 to US$50,000, and the cost of nickel raw materials for 60kwh batteries has increased by about 10,000 yuan.

Taking Tesla Model 3 as an example, the cost of the 80KWh high-nickel battery pack will increase by at least 20,000 yuan.

This is still the mid-to-high-end Tesla Model 3. For Musk, who is good at controlling costs, there are other "helping methods".

But for low-cost electric vehicles with smaller profit margins, even an increase of 10,000 yuan in battery costs is unbearable.

Just like Wuling Hongguang Mini EV, the whole vehicle will sell for more than 30,000 yuan.

Therefore, for new energy car companies, if they insist on the ternary lithium route, the direct result is that they will either "increase prices" to transfer costs, or "reluctantly" cede profits.

Either way, it is undoubtedly unsustainable.

Of course, car companies have another option, which is to use lower-cost lithium iron phosphate batteries.

This battery uses iron phosphate and does not require nickel.

Although this method can save a certain cost (lithium carbonate is also increasing in price), there are also some performance deficiencies.

First of all, the energy density is relatively low, and secondly, the low-temperature performance is poor, and the battery life reduction is also obvious, and consumers may not pay the bill.

It is not difficult to see that ternary lithium and lithium iron phosphate each have certain advantages and disadvantages, but in the context of soaring nickel prices, this has already caused a "dilemma" for new energy vehicle companies in route selection.