The government advances with the importation of more accessible electrified cars

This decree again establish a modality that the Government of Mauricio Macri had applied, which consists in authorizing a quota of electric or hybrid motor cars with tariffs Below 35% that is charged to imports of vehicles that come from outside Mercosur.

Now the Milei government decided that this quota, which established in up to 50,000 units per year for five yearsit will be with zero tariff Without distinguishing between motor types, provided they are alternative propulsion.

The only condition is that they must be vehicles with a FOB price (tax free when embarked) up to $ 16,000. And because of their technical characteristics such as autonomy and power, they have to be units of a range superior to citicars that some companies already assemble in the country.

So far, the letter of Decree 49 of the end of January. The regulations, which would begin to govern since Wednesday, would point to both technical specifications and the topic terms: within the sector, during this weekend, it was mentioned that a maximum period of four months Between the application to bring the vehicle and the moment of entry to the country, so that they are available to the public during the first semester.

The objective of the Government goes beyond “stimulating the growth of a market that allows us to disseminate the use of new technologies between an increasing number of consumers,” as the decree says.

What is also sought is to increase competition to ensure that keep going down the prices of vehiclessomething that happened only partially with the elimination of the first scale and the reduction of the second scale of internal taxes.

With this measure, several of the automotive applied strong sales to models that were in the events were out of the market for the prohibitive price imposed by those taxes, so that The available offer was increased in the concessionaires.

But since the elimination of the first scale of internal taxes was to start at 40 million pesos, did not hit the cheapest kilometerwhich have list prices between 18 and 25 million pesos.

Nor can electric and hybrid vehicles be able to compete, at least mostly, in the strip of the most “cheap” in the market. The reason is simple: no matter how much the government has decided to lower the tariff of 35% to zero, the amount of taxes charged to a car once placed in the port It ends up duplicating its FOB price. For a vehicle with an initial price of US $ 15,000, the value in the concessionaires could hardly lower the 30 million pesos, except within a “Offer War” type commercial policy.

Even so, the government measure would allow multiplying the general offer (and probably also sales), of electrified vehicles. Throughout the last year they were sold in the country 14,175 electrified units(Sales which, in turn, represented a 50% increase compared to the previous year), according to the information system of the Association of Automotive Dealers (ACARA).

For now, dominant technology remains non -plug -in hybrid vehicles (HEV), whose load is made in conventional service stations. In exchange for those who are 100%, only 700 units were sold, distributed among 23 brands.

The Secretary of Commerce and Industry, Esteban Marzorati, had advanced on the X network that evenly quotas would be assigned among automotive brands with factory in the country, grouped in Adefaand importers without factory, nucleated CIDE.

But in the last hours it transpired that, at least in a first stage, There would be no limits to brands that require bringing cars, mostly chino.

The local zero kilometer market, both conventional and electrified, started strong this year: in the first two months they patented 112,396 unitsthe double that a year ago and the highest figure from the first two -month period of 2018.

Even in that context, from the sector they estimated as unlikely that, at least this year, it goes to complete A quota of 50,000 electrified vehicles. “As the quota is great, the idea is that there is no finger assignment. Everyone can bring what they ask for,” said a source in the sector.