China’s electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer BYD plans to raise $5.2 billion in a new share sale that would be the biggest such offering in Hong Kong in four years, Bloomberg News reported on Monday, citing the terms of the placement.
The share sale will also be BYD’s largest raising of funds since the company was listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in 2002, South China Morning Post reports.
BYD aims to use the proceeds from the latest share placement to help its overseas expansion and boost research and development efforts.
The Chinese EV maker is looking to expand its production factories to places where it sells its cars as EU tariffs on China-made electric vehicles are affecting profit margins.
BYD, which remains overly reliant on the Chinese market, seeks to boost production and market share in Europe. The Chinese firm is building a factory in Szeged, Hungary, and one in Izmir, Turkey.
These two factories will have a combined capacity to produce 500,000 vehicles per year.
Localized production is aimed at going around the EU tariffs on China-made EVs, which the bloc imposed last year to protect European manufacturing from what the European Commission found was unfair EV subsidy support in China.
For BYD, the duties for its China-made vehicles are 17% on top of the 10% EU duty. Other Chinese manufacturers have higher import duties in the EU, the tariff on Geely is 18.8% and the one on SAIC is 35.3%.
BYD plans to expand in Europe in both production and retail networks, Maria Grazia Davino, one of BYD’s top European executives, said last week at a Munich conference organized by Automotive News Europe sister publication Automobilwoche.
“We have to put down roots here,” Davino said, referring to the European market.
BYD was the best-selling EV manufacturer worldwide after selling over 4 million units in 2024, according to Statista.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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