jhm, there are a lot of consumers out there. If the world auto industry builds something like 100 million total per year and plug-in sales currently at under 300K per year, then it is a .3% replacement rate per year currently, and growing. A 1% replacement rate will never replace ICE vehicles. It must be over 10% ongoing to make a substantial dent - that is 10 million plug-in vehicles sold per year worldwide. That also means 15K to 20K new public charge points per year at least, hopefully most DCFC. If the preference is long-range BEV, then such charge points need to be a loss-leader to attract consumers (they see them "everwhere" and can trust the infrastructure).
Consumers act on value exchange. If EVs are cheaper than ICE, consumers will still need lots of charge points (DCFC is the primary convenience factor and still does not beat their fast gas station "recharge"). This is not a bear-outlook. It is simply looking at the consumer acting with Ayn Rand's supposition that people are selfish and act in their own interests. Demographically, the income spread between upper and lower continues to widen and the number of people who can afford something beyond the ASP of ICE is lessening. It will be important to sell EVs below the ASP of ICE to push growth faster.
It took 100 years to get to where we are in terms of ICE proliferance. Change is coming - primarily in the form of battery-assist (BMW's angle, along with Ford/Chevy/Volvo). Give people their first <n> miles electrically and their total annual gas usage will drop 50-90%. The biggest danger to BEV is very high density batteries allowing for stuff like the Volt to become $25K MSRP with 100 mile range before engine kicks in. The value of that is "stronger" than if Tesla went to a 200 kWh battery to offer 500 mile range.
In terms of this thread, the short-term price movement is basically a gamble position on the speed of new-proliference of BEVs. Some bet on faster build-out than others, some look at it like "that would be hard to do" and so on. The gamble is with our grand-children's lives and the outcome will not be seen for a long while. I guess it is basically a quasi-religious call or put on the future. I am looking at it rationally and feel that it is not the automakers fault that people do not want to pay more to buy electric and yet have lower cost of ownership. Simple economics right now are keeping price-parity at odds with what the consumer chooses to do. The consumer says "we got gas now" and it's cheap and they gravitate toward that. Economically, If Model S60 were the same selling price as a Ford Fusion ICE, I think the Fusion would still out-sell the Model S (consider no production constraint), for example, due to the mindset of the consumer.
Consumers act on value exchange. If EVs are cheaper than ICE, consumers will still need lots of charge points (DCFC is the primary convenience factor and still does not beat their fast gas station "recharge"). This is not a bear-outlook. It is simply looking at the consumer acting with Ayn Rand's supposition that people are selfish and act in their own interests. Demographically, the income spread between upper and lower continues to widen and the number of people who can afford something beyond the ASP of ICE is lessening. It will be important to sell EVs below the ASP of ICE to push growth faster.
It took 100 years to get to where we are in terms of ICE proliferance. Change is coming - primarily in the form of battery-assist (BMW's angle, along with Ford/Chevy/Volvo). Give people their first <n> miles electrically and their total annual gas usage will drop 50-90%. The biggest danger to BEV is very high density batteries allowing for stuff like the Volt to become $25K MSRP with 100 mile range before engine kicks in. The value of that is "stronger" than if Tesla went to a 200 kWh battery to offer 500 mile range.
In terms of this thread, the short-term price movement is basically a gamble position on the speed of new-proliference of BEVs. Some bet on faster build-out than others, some look at it like "that would be hard to do" and so on. The gamble is with our grand-children's lives and the outcome will not be seen for a long while. I guess it is basically a quasi-religious call or put on the future. I am looking at it rationally and feel that it is not the automakers fault that people do not want to pay more to buy electric and yet have lower cost of ownership. Simple economics right now are keeping price-parity at odds with what the consumer chooses to do. The consumer says "we got gas now" and it's cheap and they gravitate toward that. Economically, If Model S60 were the same selling price as a Ford Fusion ICE, I think the Fusion would still out-sell the Model S (consider no production constraint), for example, due to the mindset of the consumer.