Reality Sucks -- October 12, 2019

Quick: China accounts for what percent of global EV sales?

Answer: 60%.

What would happen -- or what would the tea leaves tell you -- if EV sales in China start to fall.

Operative word: "if."

Well, it's no longer "if."

From the instituteforenergyresearch:

Sales of electric vehicles in China are slowing; year-over-year, EV sales dropped 5% in July, 2019, and dropped 11% in August, 2019 -- and this is in a centrally-managed economy with goals to cut coal usage.

I was unaware of that. That's huge. It's huge that EV sales in China last year totaled 1.3 million vehicles, or 60% of the global market. But then this: not only did EV sales fall in China, but sales fell for the first time decades last year, declining 3 percent, before falling eleven percent (11%) in the first eight months of 2019. The analysts then blame:

• China's slowing economy;
• China's trade war with the US;
• reduction in government subsidies
• removal of sales restrictions on traditional cars.

Gee whiz, Sherlock, which of those four ... well, let me re-phrase the question. How would you rank those four factors? Not ass-backwards as the writer of this article. This is likely the real ranking of what is killing EV sales in China:

• removal of sales restrictions on traditional cars (yeah, the Chinese are like Americans: they like muscle cars; they can't find charging stations)
• reduction in government subsidies (same  phenomenon we've seen in every country, including Norway)
• China's trade with with the US
• China's slowing economy

Wow, the "real" list is exactly reverse order of that presented by experts.

The graphics at the linked article show how bad things really are for EV sales in China.

 I would post those graphics, but I'm not interested. Ready to move on. Maybe I'll post them later.
But I think the real question is this: in a centrally-managed country that could literally tell its people what cars to buy, why did China make this decision to:

• remove sales restrictions on traditional cars
• reduce government subsidies for EVs

Two words:

• coal
• cash 

Institute for Energy Research? At wiki.