What happened
Shares of Nio (NIO 3.49%), a leading Chinese electric vehicle (EV) company, were sliding this morning after the company reported slowing EV sales yesterday. Investors may also be reacting to news that another EV competitor is raising prices due to rising costs.
The EV automaker's stock fell by as much as 5.6% and was down by 3.6% as of 11:26 a.m. ET.
So what
Nio said yesterday that its vehicle deliveries increased 10% in February, compared to the same time a year ago. Additionally, the company's deliveries in 2022 are up more than 23% year over year.
Image source: Nio.
But while deliveries are certainly on the rise year over year, investors may have latched onto the fact that deliveries in February were actually slowing compared to January deliveries, which had increased 34% year over year.
Making matters worse, investors may also have their eye on news coming from Rivan Automotive, which sent an email to some of its customers yesterday telling them that the price of their vehicles may be going up, even for customers who already have vehicle reservations.
Rivian is reportedly raising the prices of vehicles -- some by as much as 20% -- to offset increased production costs.
Nio investors may be seeing Rivian's latest move and wondering if the Chinese EV automaker is facing similar production cost increases as well.
Now what
Automotive deliveries can fluctuate, so it may not all be bad news for Nio that deliveries slowed in February. But investors will certainly want to keep a close eye on the company's upcoming financial results -- which will be reported on March 24 -- for any additional insights into how the company is doing.
Additionally, automakers are still dealing with complex supply chain constraints, rising inflation, and a conflict in Europe that are all causing lots of uncertainty in their industry. As investors continue to process all these macroeconomic issues, Nio investors may want to brace for more share price fluctuations in the short term.
