Chery is ready to go public, 20 years of sharpening a sword?

Chery once again announced that it was ready to go public.

On December 13, Gasgoo learned that in response to Chery's plan to submit an IPO application and related news next year, a senior executive of Chery told reporters, "The company is actively preparing for listing, and the rest of the information is inaccurate." ”

Previously, Bloomberg reported that IDG Capital is considering acquiring nearly US$1 billion (currently about 7.18 billion yuan) of Chery Holdings' parent company, and Chery Automobile is planning to submit an initial public offering (IPO) application as soon as next year, possibly seeking a valuation of up to 150 billion yuan.

Last year, Yin Tongyue set a goal of completing Chery's IPO by 2025. In this comparison, the time when Chery was rumored to be IPO news is really much earlier.

It's just that Chery, which has nearly 20 years of experience in sprinting to IPO, is it still a "new pot of old wine" when it is ready to go public this time?

The more frustrated the more courageous the listing "veteran"

Listed, Chery. The simultaneous appearance of these two words is not new.

After all, for Chery, going public is its tireless, long-term goal.

The starting point of Chery's listing road can be traced back to 2004. At that time, the Anhui Provincial Government had promoted Chery's listing, and Chery had also started shareholding reform, but it was temporarily shelved due to the fact that the equity relationship with SAIC had not yet been clarified.

In 2007, Yin Tongyue publicly stated that Chery would launch a listing and financing plan as soon as possible, but the arrival of the financial crisis forced Chery's listing process to be interrupted.

In 2008, Chery completed the shareholding system reform in a low-key manner, and started a multi-brand and brand upward plan, and the listing plan was also restarted, but with the failure of the two major brands of Riich and Weilin, the listing was no longer done.

Source: Chery

In June 2009, Chery sold 20% of its shares to five companies, including Huarong Property, CDH Investment, Bohai Investment, Shenzhen Zhongkechuang and Rongde Assets, at a price of 2.9 billion yuan, which was once considered by the market to be preparing for listing.

More than a year later, Yin Tongyue said that due to problems such as related party transactions, listing would not be considered for the time being.

In 2015, Chery's joint venture company, Chery Huiyin, failed to hit Hong Kong stocks and A-shares, and in 2016, Chery New Energy tried to "backdoor listing" through conch profiles, but still failed, and later turned to the Science and Technology Innovation Board to be listed, but still encountered obstacles.

In 2018, Chery's annual sales target has not yet been completed, and its loss has exceeded 500 million yuan, and its listing is even more unrealistic.

From 2019 to 2021, Chery showed signs of recovery. The company has achieved profitability for three consecutive years, and during the period, Qingdao Wudaokou invested 19.6 billion yuan to acquire 51% of the shares of Chery Holdings and 35.58% of the shares of Chery Holdings, becoming the largest shareholders of the two companies. Following Qingdao Wudaokou, Lixun Precision purchased 19.88% of Chery Holdings, 7.87% of Chery and 6.24% of Chery New Energy held by Qingdao Wudaokou for 10.054 billion yuan, becoming a new strategic investor of Chery.

Since then, although the news about Chery's listing has continued to come out, the relationship between the two has gradually become "ambiguous".

Chery, which has the goal of going public, no longer talks about it frequently, but is more pragmatic and seriously engages in business.

Is it a good time for Chery to go public?

Facts have proved that unlike in the past, Chery, which is now listed again, is indeed more confident.

One of the important reasons for this is its increasing sales volume and excellent performance in overseas markets.

In terms of sales volume, Gasgoo Automobile learned from Chery officials that the group's cumulative sales of cars in 2022 will reach 1,232,727 units, a year-on-year increase of 28.2%. This is the first time that Chery Group has achieved annual sales of more than one million vehicles, becoming the fifth Chinese brand car company to achieve this goal (the other four are Changan, Great Wall, Geely, and BYD).

Since the beginning of this year, Chery's sales have achieved "eleven consecutive increases". Judging from the sales volume in the past five months, Chery Group's monthly sales have reached 150,000, 170,000, 190,000 and 200,000 units.

For example, in September this year, Chery sold 190,000 cars, a year-on-year increase of 30.7%. It should be mentioned that this is the third consecutive month that Chery's sales have exceeded 150,000 units, and have risen from 150,000+ to 190,000+. Judging from the sales data of a number of Chinese brands that have been disclosed, Chery's market performance in September is second only to BYD.

From January to September this year, Chery's cumulative sales reached 1.253 million units, a year-on-year increase of 40.2%. According to the data, Chery's sales in the first three quarters of this year have exceeded that of last year (1.2327 million units). Obviously, after last year's sales exceeded one million units for the first time, Chery's sales continued to soar.

Source: Chery

In November this year, Chery sold 212076 new cars, a year-on-year increase of 111%. This is the second time that Chery's sales volume this year has exceeded 200,000+, setting a new record for monthly sales. In the first 11 months of this year, Chery's cumulative sales have reached 1665626 units, a year-on-year increase of 47.8%, and sales have reached a new high.

It is worth noting that in Chery's sales map, overseas markets play a pivotal role.

In 2022, Chery's annual exports reached 450,000 units for the first time, setting a new record for Chinese brand passenger cars to go overseas, of which exports exceeded 50,000 units in a single month for four months, breaking the monthly export record for Chinese brand passenger cars held by Chery.

In the first half of this year, Chery's export sales reached 394,000 units, accounting for 53.4% of total sales. Chery New Energy's 2023 sales target is expected to be 300,000 units in China, with another 150,000 units expected to be exported.

It is understood that Chery has established a complete overseas system, which has established more than 10 factories around the world, and has more than 1,500 sellers or service outlets, and its products are exported to 64 countries and regions in key markets including the CIS, the Middle East, South America, Africa and other key markets.

There are still concerns

However, even today's Chery has achieved a metamorphosis and no longer suffers from sales and profitability difficulties.

However, it has to be mentioned that Chery still has many "problems" to be solved.

First and foremost is the electrification transition in the new energy era. There is no doubt that Chery has "killed all sides" overseas, and the popularity of its vehicle products far exceeds the imagination of the domestic market.

It is reported that in Chile, Chery has become the third best-selling car brand in the region; in Russia, Chery has won the title of "the most popular Chinese car brand" in Russia for many years, and in the first half of this year, Chery accounted for more than 12% of the Russian automobile market share, ranking first; in Brazil, its president used Chery's Tiggo 8 as a campaign car, and also used it to receive visiting Musk......

However, it is still difficult to ignore the fact that most of the models exported by Chery are mainly fuel vehicles.

According to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology's estimates, China's new energy vehicle sales will reach about 9 million units this year, accounting for 33% of the total annual car sales, that is, for every 10 new cars, about 6 are still fuel vehicles.

According to the forecast of Gasgoo Automotive Research Institute, by 202, fuel vehicle sales will still account for 53.46% of the annual new car sales. By 2030, this proportion will drop to 28.18%.

Indeed, the new energy vehicle market is always soaring rapidly, but fuel vehicles still cannot be completely banned, and there is still a lot of stock market space. However, in the era when new energy is the mainstream, Chery cannot always tell the old story of the fuel era. Reform has always been the unchanging rule of the capital market.

Source: Chery

In fact, Chery is aware of the problem.

Yin Tongyue once publicly reflected and said frankly: "Chery 'got up early in the morning and caught up in a late set' in terms of new energy vehicles." ”

In April this year, Chery's four major brands, namely Chery, Xingtu, Jietu and iCAR, were accelerating the transition to new energy. Among them, the new energy sequence of the Xingtu brand, the Star Era, focuses on pure electric and extended range, iCAR focuses on pure electric direction, and the new energy sequence of the Jietu brand focuses on the hybrid direction.

Soon, Chery successively launched an independent new energy product series "Fengyun" and an independent new energy product series "Shanhai" of the overseas Jietu brand.

Li Xueyong, deputy general manager of Chery Automobile Co., Ltd., shouted a loud slogan of "Chery will fully open the next step of Chery's new energy growth".

But in fact, Chery's road to new energy transformation is not a smooth road.

Relevant data show that in the first half of this year, Chery sold about 40,000 new energy vehicles, a decrease of 66% over the same period last year. According to data disclosed by the Passenger Association, in the first three quarters of this year, Chery's wholesale volume of new energy vehicles was only 82,100, while Chery's new energy vehicle sales exceeded 130,000 in the first seven months of last year.

In addition, the price range of Chery New Energy's products covers the low-end price range of 30,000 yuan to 180,000 yuan, and most of them are still below 200,000 yuan. Specifically, Chery New Energy currently has a total of 6 products, including Little Ant, Big Ant, QQ Ice Cream, Unbounded Pro, and Arrizo e, with prices mostly around 100,000 yuan. And under the price war in the new energy vehicle market, the prices of the above products are still decreasing.

Among the countries where Chery's vehicle products are mainly exported, including Brazil, Russia, South Africa, Israel and other countries with underdeveloped automobile industries, Chery's vehicle products mainly rely on cost performance to hit the market.

In other words, "small profits but quick turnover" seems to describe the current embarrassing situation of Chery Automobile. Chery Automobile mainly traded low prices for sales, but this did not last.

As Yin Tongyue said before: "Brands without high-end brands are actually very pitiful, and even have no future." ”