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Tesla’s Chinese rival Nio cuts price for new Onvo-branded car

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Chinese electric car company Nio launched its lower-cost brand Onvo on Wednesday, May 15, 2024, in Shanghai, China.

CNBC | Evelyn Cheng

HEFEI, China — There’s yet another Chinese electric car aiming to undercut Tesla, with a steeper discount.

Onvo, the lower-priced brand launched by premium electric car company Nio, announced its first car, the L60 SUV, would start as low as 149,900 Chinese yuan ($21,210) when buying battery services via a monthly subscription, starting at 599 yuan. That’s the equivalent to just over $1,000 a year for “renting” the battery.

A model with the battery and the car starts at 206,900 yuan. Deliveries are set to begin Sept. 28.

Nio shares briefly rose by more than 3.5% in U.S. trading Thursday after the Onvo L60 launch.

When Nio launched the Onvo brand in May, the company said the L60 would start selling at 219,900 yuan versus Tesla‘s Model Y at 249,900 yuan.

Geely-backed Zeekr is set to launch its first midsize electric SUV, the Zeekr 7X, in China on Sept. 20, starting at 239,900 yuan.

Xpeng in late August announced its mass market brand Mona would begin sales of its M03 electric coupe in China. The basic version starts at 119,800 yuan, with a driving range of 515 kilometers (320 miles) and some parking assist features.

A version of the Mona M03 with the more advanced “Max” driver assist features and a driving range of 580 kilometers will sell for 155,800 yuan.

China's EVs will start dominating markets, says MSA Capital's Harburg

In comparison, Tesla’s cheapest car — the Model 3 — costs 231,900 yuan in China, after a price cut in April.

Chinese electric car companies have gradually expanded overseas, often starting with Europe. However, the European Union is nearing the end of a process that would increase tariffs on imported Chinese-made battery electric cars starting in early November. The bloc began an investigation into the Chinese EV makers’ use of subsidies last year.

Nio cooperated with the EU’s probe but was not sampled, meaning its cars would be subject to a 20.8% duty, as of a July announcement from the European Commission. That’s higher than the 19.9% tariffs slated for Geely cars, and 17.4% for BYD’s.

In the fourth quarter, Nio plans to start deliveries in the United Arab Emirates, CEO William Li told investors on an earnings call on Sept. 5.

“Because of the tariff in Europe now, selling or exporting cars from China to Europe becomes more expensive,” Li said, according to a FactSet transcript.

“So we will focus on the existing five European markets that we have already started. We also know that to establish NIO such a premium brand in the European market will also take a longer time, and we are very patient with that.”

Test driving BYD, Nio and other Chinese EV rivals of Tesla

“But in the meantime, it doesn’t mean that we have stopped our activities there,” Li said. “Earlier this year, we have just opened our NIO house in Amsterdam, and we are still installing and deploying our power swap stations in Europe.”

He expects the L60 to reach 10,000 monthly deliveries in December, and 20,000 vehicle deliveries a month next year. He anticipates 15% vehicle margin on the new Onvo-branded cars.

The brand aims to have more than 200 stores in China by the end of this year, and already opened more than 100 as of early September.

Li said on the earnings call that Onvo and Firefly, an even lower-priced brand set to begin deliveries next year, would look to release vehicles for the international market.

— CNBC’s Sonia Heng contributed to this report.

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Buffett denies social media rumors after Trump shares wild claim that investor backs president crashing market

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Berkshire Hathaway responds to 'false reports' on social media

Warren Buffett went on the record Friday to deny social media posts after President Donald Trump shared on Truth Social a fan video that claimed the president is tanking the stock market on purpose with the endorsement of the legendary investor.

Trump on Friday shared an outlandish social media video that defends his recent policy decisions by arguing he is deliberately taking down the market as a strategic play to force lower interest and mortgage rates.

“Trump is crashing the stock market by 20% this month, but he’s doing it on purpose,” alleged the video, which Trump posted on his Truth Social account.

The video’s narrator then falsely states, “And this is why Warren Buffett just said, ‘Trump is making the best economic moves he’s seen in over 50 years.'”

The president shared a link to an X post from the account @AmericaPapaBear, a self-described “Trumper to the end.” The X post itself appears to be a repost of a weeks-old TikTok video from user @wnnsa11. The video has been shared more than 2,000 times on Truth Social and nearly 10,000 times on X.

Buffett, 94, didn’t single out any specific posts, but his conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway outright rejected all comments claimed to be made by him.

“There are reports currently circulating on social media (including Twitter, Facebook and Tik Tok) regarding comments allegedly made by Warren E. Buffett. All such reports are false,” the company said in a statement Friday.

CNBC’s Becky Quick spoke to Buffett Friday about this statement and he said he wanted to knock down misinformation in an age where false rumors can be blasted around instantaneously. Buffett told Quick that he won’t make any commentary related to the markets, the economy or tariffs between now and Berkshire’s annual meeting on May 3.

‘A tax on goods’

While Buffett hasn’t spoken about this week’s imposition of sweeping tariffs from the Trump administration, his view on such things has pretty much always been negative. Just in March, the Berkshire CEO and chairman called tariffs “an act of war, to some degree.”

“Over time, they are a tax on goods. I mean, the tooth fairy doesn’t pay ’em!” Buffett said in the news interview with a laugh. “And then what? You always have to ask that question in economics. You always say, ‘And then what?'”

During Trump’s first term, Buffett opined at length in 2018 and 2019 about the trade conflicts that erupted, warning that the Republican’s aggressive moves could cause negative consequences globally.

“If we actually have a trade war, it will be bad for the whole world … everything intersects in the world,” Buffett said in a CNBC interview in 2019. “A world that adjusts to something very close to free trade … more people will live better than in a world with significant tariffs and shifting tariffs over time.”

Buffett has been in a defensive mode over the past year as he rapidly dumped stocks and raised a record amount of cash exceeding $300 billion. His conglomerate has a big U.S. focus and has large businesses in insurance, railroads, manufacturing, energy and retail.

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Stocks making the biggest moves midday: PLTR, CAT, AAPL JPM

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Powell sees tariffs raising inflation and says Fed will wait before further rate moves

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US Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell holds a press conference after the Monetary Policy Committee meeting, at the Federal Reserve in Washington, DC on March 19, 2025. 

Roberto Schmidt | Afp | Getty Images

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said Friday that he expects President Donald Trump’s tariffs to raise inflation and lower growth, and indicated that the central bank won’t move on interest rates until it gets a clearer picture on the ultimate impacts.

In a speech delivered before business journalists in Arlington, Va., Powell said the Fed faces a “highly uncertain outlook” because of the new reciprocal levies the president announced Wednesday.

Though he said the economy currently looks strong, he stressed the threat that tariffs pose and indicated that the Fed will be focused on keeping inflation in check.

“Our obligation is to keep longer-term inflation expectations well anchored and to make certain that a one-time increase in the price level does not become an ongoing inflation problem,” Powell said in prepared remarks. “We are well positioned to wait for greater clarity before considering any adjustments to our policy stance. It is too soon to say what will be the appropriate path for monetary policy.”

The remarks came shortly after Trump called on Powell to “stop playing politics” and cut interest rates because inflation is down.

There’s been a torrent of selling on Wall Street following the Trump announcement of 10% across-the-board tariffs, along with a menu of reciprocal charges that are much higher for many key trading partners.

Powell noted that the announced tariffs were “significantly larger than expected.”

“The same is likely to be true of the economic effects, which will include higher inflation and slower growth,” he said. “The size and duration of these effects remain uncertain.”

Focused on inflation

While Powell was circumspect about how the Fed will react to the changes, markets are pricing in an aggressive set of interest rate cuts starting in June, with a rising likelihood that the central bank will slice at least a full percentage point off its key borrowing rate by the end of the year, according to CME Group data.

However, the Fed is charged with keeping inflation anchored with full employment.

Powell stressed that meeting the inflation side of its mandate will require keeping inflation expectations in check, something that might not be easy to do with Trump lobbing tariffs at U.S. trading partners, some of whom already have announced retaliatory measures.

A greater focus on inflation also would be likely to deter the Fed from easing policy until it assesses what longer-term impact tariffs will have on prices. Typically, policymakers view tariffs as just a temporary rise in prices and not a fundamental inflation driver, but the broad nature of Trump’s move could change that perspective.

“While tariffs are highly likely to generate at least a temporary rise in inflation, it is also possible that the effects could be more persistent,” Powell said. “Avoiding that outcome would depend on keeping longer-term inflation expectations well anchored, on the size of the effects, and on how long it takes for them to pass through fully to prices.”

Core inflation ran at a 2.8% annual rate in February, part of a general moderating pattern that is nonetheless still well above the Fed’s 2% target.

In spite of the elevated anxiety over tariffs, Powell said the economy for now “is still in a good place,” with a solid labor market. However, he mentioned recent consumer surveys showing rising concerns about inflation and dimming expectations for future growth, pointing out that longer-term inflation expectations are still in line with the Fed’s objectives.

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