BEIJING – China is promising more subsidies to shore up plunging electric car sales amid the coronavirus pandemic but set limits that exclude Tesla’s made-in-China model.
Subsidies and tax breaks that were due to end this year will be extended by two years in response to “an accumulation of unfavorable factors” including the virus, the Finance Ministry said Thursday.
Beijing has spent billions of dollars subsidizing electrics in hopes of cleaning up China’s smog-choked cities and taking an early lead in a promising global industry.
That helped to turn China into the biggest market for electrics, accounting for about half of global sales. But demand sank in mid-2019 after regulators started shifting the burden to automakers by cutting