The European Commission pushed ahead with an anti-subsidy probe into Chinese EV imports in September, accusing China’s massive state subsidies of artificially depressing the price of EVs and accordingly distorting market competition.
The EU probe would probably lead to punitive tariffs on Chinese EVs.
Later that day, the market of several major European liquor groups immediately plunged, with shares of Remy Cointreau, a major spirits maker, plummeting 10.93 percent to 97 euros that morning.
Pernod Ricard, the world’s second-largest producer of spirits and wine, slid 4.76 percent in shares.
Even luxury giant LVMH (Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy) was not immune, with its shares sliding 1.96 percent due to part of its business involving wines and spirits.
The liquor market downturn also rippled out to other EU countries; Campari, a typical Italian liqueur, saw its shares decrease by 1.99 percent. Diageo, the U.K.’s leading whisky company, met with a 1.87 percent decline.
U.S.-based current affairs commentator Xing Tianxing told The Epoch Times on Jan. 9 that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is targeting European Brandy as its substantive retaliatory measure against the EU as Brandy is a pivotal export item for European countries.
Similar retaliatory measures had been frequently employed against other countries as economic coercion of the CCP, according to Mr. Xing, with Australia being a stark example.
In April 2020, Australia proposed an international investigation into the origin of the COVID-19 virus, which was spreading through the world from the central Chinese city of Wuhan due to the cover-up of the CCP authorities.
CCP-Orchested EV Industry Expansion
To dominate the international EV market, the CCP has injected considerable state funds in subsidies to prop up a low-priced EV industry to capture the global market, which is barbaric behavior that squeezes other nations, Mr. Xing said.Ursula von der Leyen, president of the EU Executive Committee, stated in the European Parliament on Sept. 12, 2023, that the committee would launch an investigation into counter-subsidies for Chinese electric vehicles.
“Europe is open to competition. Not for a race to the bottom,” she said.
Chinese automotive brand BYD Auto has expanded to 15 European countries, relying on price advantage; its electric model Atto3 was the best-selling EV in Sweden in July.
French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire has sided with the EU’s decision to investigate China’s state subsidies on EVs.
Boosted by enormous funds, China’s EV sales have increased more than 260 times in 12 years, from 5,209 units in 2009 to 1,367,000 units in 2020, with year-on-year increases of more than 100 percent in 2009, 2014, and 2015. In the first 10 months of 2021, even during the pandemic, sales of EVs exceeded 2.5 million units.
Mr. Xing believes that the CCP’s approach is contrary to how the international market operates, and “it [the CCP] uses this kind of economic coercion as a strategic weapon, first to encroach the overseas market, then to entice politicians to back down on economic interests, thus further influence or manipulate Western powerhouses.”
Therefore, if all countries unite and adopt self-protection measures, it will deter CCP’s scheme, Mr. Xing added.
Raising another layer of opinion, media worker Lai Yiming said that CCP’s overseas expansion through cheap Chinese electric cars is a “narrow trade policy” that squeezes other market partners, which will cause Chinese foreign trade enterprises to suffer significant losses.
“It is also part of the self-destructive pattern of the totalitarian regime,” Mr. Lai said.