BMW’s New Share Structure Fails to Lift Sentiment as Supply Disruptions and China Weakness Offset US Growth

BMW shares slide 37% in 2025, hit by supply bottlenecks, profit warning, and index exits. Strong EV registrations and a Deutsche Bank buy call offer limited support.

A summer surge in electric vehicle sales and a bullish call from Deutsche Bank have done little to pull BMW’s stock away from its 52-week low. The German automaker wrapped up its long-planned share unification at the start of July, converting all preferred shares into ordinary stock on a one-for-one basis without any cash contribution from holders. The move swells the free float by nearly one-fifth, but the timing could hardly be worse: the shares closed Friday at €60.66, down almost 37% since January and just €3.60 above the year’s nadir of €57.06 hit earlier in the week.

Production lines are facing fresh headwinds. BMW’s Bremen plant is running short of batteries from Hungarian supplier CATL, while severe flash flooding in Morocco has snarled the delivery of critical wiring harnesses. The company estimates it will take 30 to 45 days for those logistics routes to fully normalise. At the same time, management has warned that the automotive division’s operating margin will slip to between 1% and 3% in 2026, dragged down by weakening demand in China.

Yet on the sales front the picture is strikingly different. BMW’s core brand registered more than 26,000 new registrations in Germany last month, a jump of nearly a fifth year-on-year that left rivals Mercedes-Benz and Audi in the dust. Electric vehicles now account for well over a quarter of total sales, and in the first half the company sold roughly 126,000 cars, pulling ahead of Mercedes. Across the Atlantic, second-quarter volume in North America expanded 13%, with CEO Sebastian Mackensen noting that BMW grew faster than the overall market.

The share restructuring was meant to broaden the investor base, but the immediate consequence has been a double index exit. The S&P Europe 350 and the FTSE All-World both ejected BMW at the start of July, forcing index-tracking funds to adjust their holdings. The combination of fund outflows and the gloomy profit outlook has overwhelmed any optimism from the sales numbers.

Deutsche Bank analyst Tim Rokossa sees a different story. On Friday he upgraded the stock to “Buy” with a €90 price target, arguing that North America will serve as a strategic hub for both production and future value creation. Chart-watchers also spy a glimmer of hope: the relative strength index has climbed to 35.4, creeping out of oversold territory. If the supply bottlenecks ease by mid-August as anticipated, the robust summer trading season in the premium segment could provide a floor.

Investors now have two key dates on the calendar. An analyst call on July 10 is expected to shed light on current trading conditions, followed by the full half-year report on July 30. Without convincing volume figures in that report, the stock’s deep slide may well have further to run.