China's BYD posts record quarterly profit despite weak demand, rising competition

Investing.com -- China's BYD (SZ:002594), the country's top-selling automaker, has reported its highest-ever quarterly earnings despite headwinds from slowing demand and increased competition.

In a Hong Kong exchange filing on Monday, the electric vehicle manufacturer said it posted net profit in its third quarter of 10.41 billion yuan ($1 = 7.3156 Chinese yuan renminbi), a jump of 82.2% compared to the same time frame last year. However, the increase was slower than the 144.7% income surge in the second quarter.

Revenue, meanwhile, rose by 38.5% to 162.2B yuan.

The three-month profit total was roughly in the middle of the Shenzhen-based company's previous guidance of between 9.55B yuan to 11.55B yuan for the July to September period.

Earlier this month, Warren Buffett-backed BYD flagged an environment of intensified competition in the automobile industry, but said that it had weathered these pressures by "leveraging on its improving brand influence, continuously expanding scale advantage and strong industrial chain-wide cost control capability, demonstrating strong resilience."