BYD's export growth covers barely two-thirds of the revenue it lost at home

Back out the quarters and the half-year reads as an average of two unlike ones. Net profit attributable to shareholders was 12.3 billion yuan for the six months ^[3], 8.2 billion of it in the second quarter on Citi's reading ^[6], which leaves 4.1 billion for the first ^[20]; and because the minus 20.5% and plus 30% comparisons imply a prior-year half near 15.5 billion and a prior-year second quarter near 6.3 billion, the year-earlier first quarter sat around 9.2 billion, putting BYD's Q1 profit decline at roughly 55% ^[21]. Revenue moved the same way, 150.2 billion yuan in Q1 against about 170.6 billion a year earlier, down some 12% where Q2 fell only 3% ^{[23] [7]}. Net margin ran 2.7% and then 4.2% ^[26].

The more useful arithmetic, or rather the version that explains Monday, is on the mix. If the half totalled about $51 billion after a 7.1% fall ^{[4] [2]}, the prior-year half was near $54.9 billion; if overseas was $27 billion after 34% growth ^[5], the prior-year overseas was near $20.1 billion, which leaves domestic at roughly $34.8 billion then and $24 billion now ^[24]. The home market shed about $10.8 billion while the export book added about $6.9 billion, so overseas growth replaced 64 cents of every dollar lost in China ^[24]. Overseas is now 52.9% of sales ^[18], a first for the company ^[10], and that milestone is as much subtraction as addition.

One caution on the $27 billion: divide it by the 792,000 vehicles exported ^[8] and you get about $34,100 a unit ^[19], which is not a car price, so the overseas line carries considerably more than exported vehicles and neither publisher breaks out how much.

What is holding the equity up is Citi's full-year net profit of 41.2 billion yuan, described as potentially 8% above consensus ^[12]. Against 12.3 billion already booked, that asks for 28.9 billion in the second half, 2.35 times the first ^[25]. Citi's 13.5 billion Q3 core-earnings figure ^[12] is a different measure from net profit, so it is not the same test. The mix lever behind it is real enough: Fangchengbao, Denza and Yangwang grew 61% to 12.8% of group passenger-vehicle sales ^[13].

Domestic pricing could settle, premium mix could carry margin, and the 2.35 could happen ^[25]. Or exports keep compounding off 67.8% growth ^[8] straight into European protectionism, tariffs and freight ^[16], and the replacement ratio stays below one. Or the domestic drop is largely a comparison against subsidised volume and reverts. This is probably wrong, but the last of those looks weakest, because BYD's own 31% Greater China decline ^[11] is steeper than the more-than-20% first-half China revenue falls at Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz, BMW and Porsche ^{[15] [27]}, and the company itself pointed at sluggish domestic demand alongside commodity and chip costs ^[9]. A price war that takes a third of the local champion's home revenue is evidence that the whole market is contracting, with BYD losing ground at home right alongside the incumbents it is supposedly beating.

Note where the money is going meanwhile: into Denza's European premium build ^[17] and the shipping and tariff bill attached to those 792,000 units ^[16], rather than into buying domestic share back on price. BYD did outsell Tesla on first-half EV volume ^[28]. If the second half repeats the first, though, the group contracts about 7% again while its overseas line grows a third ^{[2] [5]}, which describes a company converting a home market into a logistics business at 64 cents on the dollar ^[24].