BYD’s Great Tang Pre-Order Frenzy Fails to Lift Shares as EU Tariff Clouds and Home Sales Slump Loom

Despite 150,000 pre-orders for its new Great Tang SUV, BYD's stock languishes near a 52-week low, dragged by a 20% domestic sales decline, internal restructuring, and looming EU tariffs on plug-in hybrids.

More than 150,000 Chinese drivers have already reserved BYD’s new seven-seat SUV, the Great Tang, yet the automaker’s stock is trading barely a whisker above its 52-week low. The disconnect between roaring product demand and a moribund share price underscores the scale of the challenges facing the Shenzhen-based group: a deepening domestic sales slide, an internal restructuring, and the threat of punitive European tariffs on the plug-in hybrids that have fuelled its export growth.

BYD shares closed at €8.90 on Friday, just 0.85% above the 52-week trough of €8.82. On the week the stock shed roughly 6%, taking its year-to-date loss to nearly 19%. The Relative Strength Index has fallen to 25.6, deep in oversold territory, while the gap to the 200-day moving average has widened to almost 19%. Technical analysts often view such extremes as a precursor to a bounce, but the fundamental headwinds give little reason for optimism.

The most immediate drag is a sharp slowdown at home. Between January and May 2026, BYD delivered roughly 1.4 million vehicles, a 20% decline from the same period a year earlier. To arrest that slide, management has embarked on a structural overhaul: the central research and development department is being broken up into five brand-specific units, each responsible for its own front-end engineering and planning. The goal is to eliminate duplication and tighten margin control – a model already employed by rival Geely for its premium marques.

Outside China, the picture is more promising but also more precarious. BYD’s electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles have become best-sellers in markets such as Germany and Spain, but the European Commission is now preparing to extend punitive tariffs to Chinese-made PHEVs. Pure battery-electric BYD models already carry an additional 17% duty on top of the standard 10% import tariff, giving them a total levy of 27%. PHEVs have so far entered the bloc at only 10%, but that loophole looks set to close, threatening the very segment that has propelled BYD’s export momentum.

Yet the company is pressing ahead with an ambitious global expansion. Chairman Wang Chuanfu told the annual general meeting that BYD aims to become the world’s largest automaker by 2030, and is building a network of factories to make that possible. Mass production is already under way at new plants in Thailand and Indonesia; a Brazilian facility is being set up to manufacture both vehicles and battery-storage systems; and in Hungary, BYD’s first European factory is nearing operational readiness. The overseas push reduces reliance on the fiercely competitive home market, but it also demands massive capital spending that weighs on near-term profitability.

May’s delivery figures offered a sliver of encouragement. BYD sold roughly 383,000 vehicles during the month, a modest year-on-year increase that ended an eight-month streak of declining shipments. Whether that marks a genuine recovery or merely a blip remains to be seen, but it suggests the home-market contraction may be stabilising.

All eyes are now on the Great Tang. Priced from about 239,900 yuan (roughly €35,500), the flagship of the Dynasty line features a 1,000-volt architecture that can charge the battery from 10% to 70% in just five minutes. Vice-President Stella Li has confirmed that the SUV is scheduled to launch in Europe and the Asia-Pacific region by late 2026 or early 2027. The pre-order deluge hints at strong pent-up demand, but whether BYD can turn that into profitable, tariff-proof sales outside China will be the real test. The semi-annual results due in July will provide the first hard evidence of whether the restructuring and the product offensive are gaining traction – or whether the stock’s slide still has further to run.