China's Commerce Minister held a video talk with an executive vice president of the European Commission.
China and the European Union will consult on the latter's investigation into Chinese electric vehicles (EVs) after preliminary tariffs are announced.
On June 22, China's Commerce Minister Wang Wentao was invited to hold a video talk with Valdis Dombrovskis, executive vice president of the European Commission.
The two sides agreed to initiate consultations on the EU's anti-subsidy investigation case against China's EVs, according to a brief statement on China's Ministry of Commerce website.
On June 12, the European Commission pre-disclosed the level of provisional anti-subsidy duties to be imposed on imports of battery electric vehicles (BEVs) from China.
If discussions with the Chinese authorities do not lead to an effective solution, these provisional anti-subsidy duties will be introduced from July 4, according to the European Commission's statement at the time.
The final measures should be implemented within four months of the imposition of the provisional duties, according to the European Commission's statement.
Following the release of the EU's statement, a spokesperson for China's Ministry of Commerce said that China is highly concerned and strongly dissatisfied, and that China's industry is deeply disappointed and resolutely opposed to this.
China urges the EU to immediately correct its wrong practices and properly handle economic and trade frictions through dialog and consultation, the spokesman said.
The EU originally imposed a 10 percent tariff on BEVs imported from China, and in the newly announced provisional tariffs, different car companies face different rates.
BYD, Geely and SAIC, which were sampled and cooperated with the investigation, will be subject to additional tariffs of 17.4 percent, 20 percent and 38.1 percent, respectively.
Other Chinese BEV producers that cooperated in the investigation but have not been sampled will pay a weighted average duty of 21 percent, with Nio (NYSE: NIO) and Xpeng (NYSE: XPEV) falling into this category.
All other BEV producers in China which did not cooperate in the investigation would be subject to 38.1 percent residual duty.
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