Morgan Stanley Overweight on Li Auto as founder pushes for 30K sales in June

Morgan Stanley reiterated an Overweight rating and $40.00 price target on Li Auto (NASDAQ:) after conducting store checks and speaking with salespeople.

According to Morgan Stanley’s latest store checks, Li Auto’s overall foot traffic in flagship locations in Tier 1 cities improved 16% MoM to a record YTD volume in May. The electric automaker’s L7/L8 continues to gain traction, despite peers’ competitive model launches, driving customers to take a closer look at Li Auto’s models for comparison.

In May, the company’s retail conversion rate (the ratio of order intake to foot traffic) remained impressive at 8%, surpassing Li Auto’s historical average of 5-6% in 2022 and the industry average of 4-5%. The increased conversion rate was likely driven by successful test drives/rides of the L7 Air and L8 Air models, as well as the company’s distinct product positioning. These models specifically targeted families and exhibited exceptional price performance compared to competing models from other companies.

Based on Morgan Stanley’s chats with store salespeople, all the models saw a solid increase in May. The L7 model was the most popular, making up 40-50% of total orders, followed by the L8 and L9 models, which each accounted for 25% of orders. The Li One also had double-digit growth in May as the company worked on selling off inventory. Some of the salespeople even suggested that Li Auto’s overall orders could reach around 30,000 units in May as they expanded their sales channels.

Analysts wrote in a note, “With sufficient order book and growing store footprints, the founder of Li Auto continues to target 30k sales in June. Along with solid April and May sales, Li Auto is poised to beat the high end of 2Q guidance (76-81k) by 3k if June sales can reach 30k as guided, and underpins the company’s 40k monthly in late 2H.”

Shares of LI are up 1.91% in premarket trading on Wednesday.