Global tire companies' competitiveness ranking for 2025 released
As of April 30, 2025, the main board listed tire companies disclosed their financial data for 2024. If only the sales of tire business are calculated, the performance of tire companies in 2024 is not as strong as expected. The total sales of 21 tire companies, including the leading foreign-funded tire companies, fell by 5.66% year-on-year compared with 2023, with total revenue of approximately RMB 966.6 billion.
The decline in foreign-funded tire sales is the main reason for the decrease in total revenue this year. Many foreign-funded tire companies pointed out in their financial reports that the high-quality and cost-effective Asian tires have had a strong impact on their sales. Did it really cause an impact? Yes, China's tire overseas sales set a new record, selling 11 billion yuan more tires than in 2023. This also led to a "big surge" in the revenue of Chinese tire companies in 2024!
Record-breaking, revenue of many tire companies soared
In 2024, the sales performance of Chinese tire companies continued the strong performance in 2023. The total revenue of 11 Chinese main board listed tire companies reached 162.391 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 12.10% over 2023.
Six listed tire companies entered the 10 billion club, and Guizhou Tire completed the key leap of 10 billion sales. Sailun Tire's sales exceeded the 30 billion mark, reaching 31.802 billion yuan, and its operating income increased by 22.42% year-on-year. Zhongce Rubber maintained its first place in Chinese tire sales with sales of nearly 40 billion yuan.
At the same time, the ranking of Shandong tire companies also changed due to sales in 2024-Prin Chengshan entered the top three Shandong tires with sales of 10.974 billion yuan.
Thanks to the release of new production capacity of Chinese tire companies between 2023 and 2024, the total revenue growth of listed tire companies that disclosed their sales in 2024 was basically the same as the growth rate of total sales.
In recent years, in order to seize the sales opportunities under the wave of "foreign brand substitution" in the global tire market, Chinese tire companies have continuously increased their global production capacity supply. The production capacity growth of more than 100 million in two years has effectively helped Chinese tire companies provide high-performance and high-quality tire products to global users and helped Chinese tire companies improve their market expansion capabilities.
In 2024, the tire production of listed Chinese tire companies increased by nearly 17%, while the sales of Chinese tire products (10 listed tire companies) increased by 13.67%. Among them, the overseas market contributed as much as 43.99% to the sales of listed tire companies.
Focusing on overseas markets, net profit growth exceeded revenue
It can be said that one of the important supports for the record high sales of Chinese tire companies in 2024 is the overseas market. The sales of listed Chinese tire companies in overseas markets in 2024 reached RMB 71.43 billion, an increase of 18.24% year-on-year compared with 2023. The overseas sales of 7 tire companies increased by more than 10%.
The overseas sales of GM, Guizhou and Sailun tire companies grew fastest, exceeding 54%, 25% and 23% respectively. The globalization strategy is one of the key factors for tire companies to achieve high growth in overseas market revenue in 2024. While helping tire companies cope with the complex and changing international economic environment and improve their risk resistance, it also further helps tire companies improve their service capabilities for localized operations in overseas markets.
Of course, sales in overseas markets not only bring higher sales to Chinese tire companies, but also make great profit contributions to tire companies. In 2024, the net profit of China's listed tire companies exceeded 16.2 billion yuan, an increase of 20.9% over 2023, which is greater than the growth rate of revenue. The gross profit margin of more than 20% in overseas markets has become an important support for the profitability of Chinese tires.
If in some tire companies, the sales of overseas and domestic markets are still equal (some tire companies have a higher proportion of domestic sales); but turning over the profits, the profits of overseas markets account for at least 70%. Compared with domestic factories of the same size, even if domestic factories sell more truck tires with higher unit prices, after calculating the (gross) profit, it will be found that overseas factories are more than 4 times that of domestic factories - domestic factories make less than 15 yuan from selling truck tires, while overseas factories can make 50 yuan from selling car tires.
This also explains why Chinese tire companies have begun to try to expand production capacity in more places in recent years. North America, Europe, Africa, and even South America currently have tire companies deploying production capacity; even in Southeast Asia, where Chinese overseas factories are concentrated, Zhongce Rubber and Sailun Tire have opened up a new production base in Indonesia, and Prinx Chengshan has begun to explore the production capacity potential in Malaysia. The most exciting overseas factory in 2024 is Linglong's Serbia factory. The official commissioning and further expansion of the factory mark the beginning of the real "localization operation" of Chinese tire companies in the European market.
Another important news related to overseas production capacity is that Guizhou has expanded passenger car tire production capacity at its overseas base. In 2024, Guizhou Tire has laid out 6 million semi-steel radial tire production lines at its production base in Vietnam, and plans to open the production lines within 2025. This is the first time in Guizhou Tire's nearly 70-year history that it has entered the passenger car tire competition. With the enrichment of its product matrix, Guizhou Tire is expected to achieve new sales breakthroughs in the overseas market in 2025.
Judging from the profit performance of various tire companies, Sentury has entered the third place among listed tire companies with a net profit of 2.186 billion yuan. In 2024, Sentury achieved a high profit growth of nearly 60% under the situation that orders in the overseas tire market were in short supply and the domestic high-end tire market share continued to break through. It is the tire company with the largest profit growth among Chinese tire companies in 2024. At the same time, Sentury also released the full-steel tire production capacity of its overseas factories in 2024, achieved a breakthrough in the sales of 916,400 full-steel tires, and achieved double growth in revenue and profit by enriching its product portfolio.
At the end of 2024, Sentury's Moroccan factory will be put into production, which will bring stronger driving force for Sentury's sales expansion in the European market.
A good start in 2025
However, while the overseas market brings high revenue and high profits, it also brings considerable risks to tire companies. In April 2025, the reciprocal tariffs imposed by the United States on global imports are, to a certain extent, a warning to Chinese tire companies that they are highly dependent on overseas markets. Although the US market accounts for less than 1% of the revenue of many tire companies, the high dependence of Chinese tire companies on profits in overseas markets also makes the tariff crisis like a "Sword of Damocles" hanging over their heads all the time-I don't know what risk will suddenly hit Chinese tire companies one day.
Of course, the price of raw materials has the same effect as tariffs on China's tire business. In the first quarter of 2025, due to the price of raw materials, the profits of many tire companies declined significantly. In the first quarter of 2025, the revenue of six listed tire companies reached 23.057 billion yuan. Although it increased by 8.29%, the sales of some companies fell by more than 5% compared with the previous year; net profit fell to 2.076 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 21%.
The surge in raw materials was the main reason for the decline in profits. However, under the background of overall pressure on the industry, Sailun Tire continued its high-quality development trend in the first quarter and became the tire company with double growth in revenue and net profit in the list.
Among foreign-funded tire companies, Michelin has disclosed relevant data, and sales are still declining. However, Michelin said that in 2025, as the automobile market gradually recovers its vitality, the tire industry will also gradually ease the pressure. Whether this is true, we will wait and see.
