Tesla's China-made car shipments rise even as general car sales slump

Tesla Inc. shipments of China-made cars to the local market rose for a second straight month in September, even as general auto sales declined.

Elon Musk’s electric-vehicle maker reported domestic shipments of 52,153 units last month, following a near-50% jump in August. The automaker exported 3,853 vehicles from its Shanghai factory, China’s Passenger Car Association said on Tuesday. That meant Tesla’s total China shipments in September climbed 27% from August to 56,006.

The increase is in line with the broader trend for the automaker, which delivered a record 241,300 cars worldwide in the third quarter. At last week’s annual shareholder meeting, Musk said Tesla’s Shanghai factory is now outproducing the Fremont, California plant.

In China, the back-to-back gain in shipments suggests Tesla is moving on from a run of bad publicity, starting in April when a protest by a disgruntled owner at the Shanghai auto show went viral on social media. That was followed by a spate of crashes and regulatory scrutiny of safety and customer service issues, and more recently a driver successfully suing Tesla for fraud over his purchase of a second-hand Model S.

Overall retail sales of cars, sport utility vehicles and multipurpose vehicles and minivans fell 17% in September from a year earlier to 1.61 million units, the PCA data showed.

Deliveries of new-energy vehicles, which include EVs and plug-in hybrids, soared 202% from a year earlier to 334,000 units last month.