Nearly 80% of lithium battery companies last year, net profit growth, car prices, this year or good times no longer

  As the sales volume of new energy vehicles exceeded 500,000 units in 2016, as an important part of electric vehicles, structural overcapacity caused the power lithium battery listed companies to achieve a substantial increase in profits last year.

According to the data, as of February 23, 122 lithium battery companies that announced the 2016 annual report performance forecast, according to the maximum change in the forecast net profit, nearly 80% of enterprises achieved net profit growth. Among them, the number of enterprises with the largest increase in net profit forecasting more than 100% year-on-year reached 48; the number of enterprises with a forecast net profit exceeding 100 million yuan was 68.

Among them, BYD expects net profit in 2016 to be as high as 5.2 billion yuan. With the stabilization and recovery of the traditional fluoride salt market, the benefits of multi-fluorination have been significant. The company expects to achieve a net profit of 529 million yuan in 2016, an increase of 1250%.

However, with the introduction of new energy vehicle subsidies in 2017, the pressure on power battery companies to reduce costs will surge. Some experts in the lithium battery industry told reporters that the price requirements for battery manufacturers in some electric passenger car manufacturers in 2017 are 35%-40% lower than 2016. In 2017, in order to guarantee the market and profit of its own brand, new energy auto manufacturers will strictly control the cost of supporting power lithium batteries and lower the price of power battery manufacturers.

Nearly 80% of lithium battery companies' net profit growth

60 net profits exceeded 100 million yuan

In fact, from the "Automobile Power Battery Industry Standard Conditions (2017)" to raise the industry's production capacity threshold, the "Interim Measures for the Management of Recycling and Utilization of New Energy Vehicles' Power Battery " (Consultation Draft) for Establishing and Perfecting the Waste Power Battery Resource Utilization Standard System In January this year, the “Long-term Development Plan for the Automotive Industry” involving the specific energy and cost of the battery, the relevant departments issued a series of policies for the power lithium battery industry to allow the power lithium battery industry to fully bloom.

Among the 122 lithium battery companies that announced the 2016 annual report performance forecast, BYD's net profit income made BYD the first place; Zhongtian Technology's second-served net profit was 1.778 billion yuan, an increase of 80%; Tianqi Lithium The industry ranked third with a revenue of 1.689 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 581%. In terms of net profit growth, Mengshi Technology expects to achieve a net profit of 160 million yuan in 2016, an increase of 5647.95%;

It is worth noting that in 2016, the performance of lithium-ion cathode materials, electrolytes, equipment, lithium batteries, etc. represented by Dangsheng Technology, Tianci Materials, Zhangzhou Pearl and Keheng Co., etc., all rose sharply year-on-year. Net profit increased by 652%, 310%, 150% and 148%, respectively. In contrast, even if the net profit growth rate is not high, Yiwei Lithium Energy's 2016 net profit will reach 242 million yuan to 284 million yuan.

In addition, the reporter found that most of the power lithium battery companies announced that although the main business entered a period of rapid growth, but due to strong market demand, the supply of products in short supply, resulting in a backlog of orders, product sales prices have increased significantly, promoting the company's operating income and profits The scale is growing rapidly.

Battery companies are investing heavily

M&A of raw materials and equipment companies

In 2017, the new "Power Battery Enterprise Standard Conditions" will be introduced soon, and its changes in capacity requirements will enable power battery companies to increase capital investment in production lines.

The reporter learned that the current domestic power battery has formed the first echelon of BYD, CATL, Waterma, Guoxuan and Lishen, and its production capacity is more than double that of the second echelon battery company. The data shows that in 2016, the five power battery companies shipped more than 20GWH, accounting for more than 75% of the Chinese power lithium battery market.

"The further improvement of the power battery threshold will affect the entire industry to a large extent. Some small and medium-sized enterprises are bound to be merged and restructured by more powerful companies," said Cao He, an analyst at the national securities auto industry.

According to statistics, the actual investment amount of the lithium battery industry chain in 2016 exceeded 60 billion yuan. Among them, power batteries, cathode materials, and diaphragms have the largest investment. The investment scale of power battery and cathode material is large, and it is strongly influenced by funds due to market demand and capital demand of individual projects. Taking the power battery 1GWH as an example, the required capital investment is more than 800 million yuan (domestic equipment production line), and the large non-power battery companies themselves can complete.

Parallel to investment is frequent mergers and acquisitions. In 2016, there were nearly 60 domestic M&A projects in the lithium battery industry. The M&A case types mainly focused on upstream and downstream integration and cross-border acquisitions. As lithium battery raw materials and equipment companies have higher yields, they are more likely to become the subject of mergers and acquisitions.

It is worth mentioning that the second echelon also has enterprises with comprehensive competitive advantages in terms of price, technology and safety. These enterprises are expected to expand their own strengths in various ways in the future and narrow the gap with the first echelon.

In fact, a number of power batteries have begun planning for capacity expansion. Yiwei Lithium is expected to achieve 5GWh-6GWh in early 2017, and 9GWh is expected by the end of 2017; Tianneng Group will achieve 8GWH capacity for lithium batteries in early 2017; Fueng Technology will have an annual production capacity of 5GWh in 2017.

In this regard, Wang Binggang, head of the National New Energy Vehicle Technology Innovation Engineering Expert Group, believes that integrated mergers and acquisitions will accelerate the elimination process of third- and fourth-line power battery companies, especially those with backward technology and low-end positioning. "Now it is said that overcapacity, in fact, good production capacity is not left, this can be seen from the performance report of some listed companies, the products of leading enterprises are not selling."