JBChiangRai

It's normal for prices to come down on new technology past the early adopter phase. I do think we will see BYD prices drop further. It's to be expected that a very few people will switch back to ICE, but we are talking about a handful compared with the thousands buying them every month who are switching from ICE to EV. I remember the launch of the Good Cat GT and thought why would anyone pay that much more to upgrade a standard Ora Good Cat to something approaching the performance of the MG4? Sometimes it's hard to fathom how far away manufacturers ideas are compared to consumers. The Toyota bZ4x is a perfect example, people are not beating their way to Toyota to pay 150% more than they need to over the far superior Atto 3 which has the same BYD blade batteries and a better motor. If you mean the month compared to it's equivalent month in the previous year? I don't think we will ever see this happen 3 times in a row in our lifetime (in Thailand). He can only adjust those Chinese manufacturers who haven't already contracted to build factories here. Thailand would be in breach of contract to do that. He could however harmonise the duty rate for Chinese EV imports with Japan for those manufacturers who aren't building assembly plants here. I suspect companies like Toyota are lobbying VERY VERY hard for something like this.

I don’t think the prices will change when the incentives end. IIRC the Seal price in Australia is identical to Thailand with no incentives to the manufacturer available.

It’s a conundrum. Low cost Chinese EV’s will enable mass adoption of EV’s but kill the American auto manufacturing industry but keep consumers happy. Preventing low cost Chinese EV’s will massively slow the adoption of EV’s, perhaps preventing it for many years, save the American auto manufacturing industry but annoy consumers. The same applies in the UK and EU. You have only to look at what is happening in Thailand where there are no barriers to Chinese EV.

Do you mean drop in sales? Or drop in growth? Or drop in market share?

China is not particularly known for honouring IP

I think the market will polarize into China/Tesla vs. everyone else. China & Tesla have got their supply chains sorted out and both can afford to price their vehicles in a way that disrupts Japan, USA & Germany.

I don't have any first hand experience, but I think PCP does appear as fleet. You don't own the vehicle unless and until you make the final balloon payment. It is owned by the finance company who buy the car initially, so I suspect it will appear as fleet as the same company is also providing contract hire and lease vehicles to businesses. I am fairly sure any analysis of fleet versus personal purchases will include PCP & Lease cars in the "fleet" category. Incidentally, JCT600 (owned by Jack C Tordoff) was my local Porsche dealer in the UK.

When the energy costs and then interest rate increases happened in the UK, I predicted that people who owned their cars would hang onto them longer and most people in the market for a car would either downgrade their choice or by a second hand beater. Disposable income is way down in the UK and their mortgage costs have gone through the roof, so have the costs of heating their homes. People prioritize their home over their car. Car lease/PCP rates have increased enormously because of interest rates too. There has been a switch since I left the UK 2 decades ago. People used to buy their cars, now they lease or PCP them. Cars are becoming unaffordable for a lot of people. There are still great tariffs available for overnight charging your EV making it many times cheaper than petrol. However, the DC Chargers available are sometimes more than 30x the cost of charging at home. This needs to be addressed.

I prefer to take Media Fact Check's view on bias rather than yours. I didn't assert Rowan was wrong about H2, I asserted Mr Toyoda was wrong about H2 and I explained why. Toyota couldn't have employed me, firstly I wasn't available and secondly I was busy building my computer company and floating it on the Alternative Investment Market in the UK, I am biased but I consider that extreme success allowing me to retire to Thailand in my 40's.

If I am honest, the Neta V would probably be a much more sensible choice for me than my BYD Seal Performance. But when has motoring ever been about being sensible. Last week there was a Ford Mustang 5.0 next to me at the traffic lights and signaled me to gun it, I left him for dead off the line, fortunately the next lights 300m down the road were at red and I resumed OAP mode.

Me too, it's a PITA

The Neta V is directly comparable to the Mitsubishi Mirage, similar price although the Neta V is bigger. Give me that choice and I would take the Neta V in a heartbeat.

Overall, we rate ZeroHedge an extreme right-biased conspiracy website based on the promotion of false/misleading/debunked information that routinely denigrates the left. ZeroHedge - Bias and Credibility - Media Bias/Fact Check (mediabiasfactcheck.com) Rowan Atkinson & Toyoda both made these comments quite a while ago, there is nothing new here. Toyoda's stance on Hydrogen (H2) is wrong, there will always be a place for H2 alongside BEV but consumers will prefer BEV because it will always be 5 times cheaper per km than H2. It has to be, because you (ideally) use sunlight, wind or wave power to produce electricity. At this point you can either ... Put it in the power grid and plug your car in and charge it directly, or (and here's the rub)... You electrolyse water and produce Hydrogen and Oxygen, losses are about 50% (they have to be because you're producing Oxygen too). Then you can compress it using more electricity, store it in tanks, transfer it to tankers (pumping it with more electricity). Drive those tankers to H2 stations (using H2 to drive the vehicle). Pump it into the Fuel Stations tanks (using more electricity). Then pump it into your car (using more electricity). Then convert it to electricity in a Fuel Cell (very inefficient also wastes energy in the form of heat). So the consumer will make his choice on economics and market conditions, he will prefer the cheap running cost of BEV, so H2 cars will have to be a lot cheaper to tempt him. QED, H2 will not happen the way Toyoda said.

The proof of the pudding is in the eating. The fact is simply this. The EV market share of new registrations is increasing month on month, anything saying otherwise is simply deflection. People like EV's, in Thailand they buy or finance them, in the UK they lease or PCP them (they then appear as fleet purchases).

I think the Mirage is closer to a Neta V, similar size and similar price, Mirage 509k and Neta 499K Years to break even = 0

Sorry but I think that is mostly nonsense. You can't compare prices in the UK compared with Thailand. The MG4 is more expensive in the UK because there is an import tax on Chinese vehicles. Even so, next to the Tesla Model Y the MG4 was the next best EV seller in the UK last year achieving almost 10% market share amongst EV's. It is probably the current best value for money EV in the UK. The UK & US to some extent, represent different challenges. Chinese EV imports will disrupt the local market and we are going to hear more misleading headlines like "The West’s humiliating electric car climbdown has begun" when it would be better written as "Consumers shun Western EV's in favour of Chinese EV's" or "Chinese EV sales continue to accelerate whilst Western EV sales decline" and ultimately "Western Auto manufacturers file for bankruptcy-Chinese Ev manufacturers to blame". Demand is not falling in the UK, it is growing, I suggest you look at the sales figures published by the SMMT during this year to see what happens. BEV sales are up 21% this year on last year. UK new car registration data, UK car market - SMMT

A home charging point is desirable, but not essential, if overnight charging you can cope with the portable device they give you plugged into a normal outlet. Your electricity bill will go up by about a 20%-25% of what you would normally spend on petrol. Lots of charging points in Thailand, public charging points could be anything between roughly the same and double, you could spend more but you don't need to. There are 4 budget EV's I would like at and test driving them is vital. Neta V at 499k, MG4 and BYD Dolphin and MG EP+ at 771k if you want a big car. They all drive superbly, but differently so it will come to personal choice.

If you do push it, you will need the PIN number to unset it !!!

I just had another sleepless night, I spent all night in the garage looking for any sign of smoke in case these darned EV's catch fire. This morning I called the buyer of my daughter's MG EP+ to offer him a refund, as clearly I charged him too much, thanks to @ExpatOilWorker it's clear I should have allowed more depreciation.

So a petrol car only drops by 4% and a diesel car by only 3%... I don't think so

No, just take the blue book to DLT or an agent.

I will probably remove my wrap after 2 years and repaint in the same colour.

Bib: When did your reflection tell you there had been a crime committed? MissA: When his cheque bounced.

Yes I am not surprised. It does appear there is poor paint adhesion on the plastic bumpers.

Last year, the UK car of the year was the MG4 EV.