A trade slump

China’s exports in December dropped by 9.9% year-on-year to $306.08 billion, the sharpest monthly decline since February 2020, according to China Customs. Imports declined by 7.5% to $228.07 billion for a trade surplus of $78.01 billion, an increase of $8.17 billion from November.

The clear lithium-ion battery market leader in China in 2022 was CATL 宁德时代, with a share of 48.2% according to the China Alliance for Electric Vehicles. BYD 比亚迪 was in second place with 23.45%. Yesterday, CATL released a 2022 profit forecast of up to 31.5 billion yuan ($4.64 billion), a year-on-year increase of 97.72%.

SinoHytec 亿华通, known as China’s leading hydrogen energy company, IPO’d on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange yesterday, raising a total of HK$983 million ($125.82 million). The share price closed flat after the first day at HK$60 ($7.67).

There will be more than 10 million new energy vehicles (NEVs) sold in China in 2023, according to Zhāng Yǒngwěi 张永伟, vice chairperson of the electric vehicle industry organization China EV100. This would be a 40% increase from the 6.88 million NEVs sold in 2022, of which about 80% were pure electric vehicles.