BEIJING/SHANGHAI (Reuters) - China's BYD Co (SZ:002594) Ltd on Monday posted record third-quarter earnings, its highest ever for any quarter, as the electric vehicle giant preserved its domestic market leadership despite softer demand and increased competition.
Net profit for the third quarter reached 10.41 billion yuan ($1.42 billion), a 82.2% increase from a year earlier, on a 38.5% rise in revenue to 162.15 billion yuan, BYD said in a stockmarket filing. It flagged earlier this month that third-quarter net profit could as much as double.
That was a smaller increase than the second quarter when profit was up 145%. The third-quarter earnings figure was within its forecast range of between 9.55 billion yuan and 11.55 billion yuan.
Sales by the Shenzhen-based EV giant, whose investors include Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRKa), have continued to grow robustly despite several of its rivals cutting prices amid softening demand in the world's largest auto market.
BYD logged 22.12% in third-quarter gross profit margin, compared with 18.73% in the second quarter, according to Reuters' analysis of the automaker's financial disclosure.
By comparison, Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA)'s gross margin, hit by aggressive price cuts particularly in China, stood at 17.9% in the quarter ended September, shy of analyst forecasts of over 18% and down from 18.2% in the second quarter.
BYD, which has been expanding overseas along with several other Chinese EV makers, broke records with new energy vehicle (NEV) sales up 53% year-on-year to 824,001 in the third quarter, company data showed. The automaker sold 71,231 NEVs in overseas markets during the third quarter, a surge of 323% on the year.
The company began selling its second EV model in Japan in September and has banked on partnerships to expand sales in Southeast Asia.
China's overall NEV sales were up 22.1% in September from a year earlier, accounting for 36.6% of total car sales. NEV sales growth, however, cooled from a 34.5% gain in August.
($1 = 7.3156 Chinese yuan renminbi)