Big growth for China’s BYD: They are getting closer to Tesla in terms of car sales

Chinese producer&dstro;ač of electric cars, BYD reported a jump in sales at the end of 2024, signaling a move closer to America’s Tesla in the race for the position of the world’s most popular brand.

BYD sold 207,734 battery-powered electric cars in December, nine percent more than in the same period last year, according to a report published on Wednesday.

In the whole of 2024, they sold a total of 1.76 million of them, 12 percent more than in the previous year, the BBC quotes data from the report.

The Chinese company sold a total of 4.25 million cars powered by new energy sources last year, 41 percent more than in 2023. Sales of hybrid models jumped by 73 percent.

BYD sells 90 percent of its vehicles in its native China, offering discounts to customers in order to beat the competition. At the same time, Beijing is encouraging citizens to replace old vehicles with electric ones, offering them subsidies.

Last year, the automobile giant increased its advantage over foreign competitors, such as Volkswagen and Toyota, on its home market, and on a global level, it came close to the American Tesla, which currently occupies the first place in the world ranking by sales.

In the third quarter, the American company maintained its leading position in sales, with 462,890 delivered electric cars. BYD sold 443,426 of them in the period from July to September, data show.

The Chinese giant overtook Tesla for the first time in the summer quarter with a revenue of 28.2 billion dollars, 24 percent more than in the same period of the previous year. Tesla closed the period from July to September with a revenue of 25.2 billion dollars, eight percent more than in the same period in 2023.