Deutsche Bank raised its price target on Nio‘s Hong Kong-listed shares to HK$ 80 from HK$ 76 in a research note dated Monday, while increasing the 2026 sales estimates for the Shanghai-headquartered company.
The German bank reiterated its Buy rating on the stock, with the new target implying roughly 60% upside from Monday’s closing price of HKD 50.15.
Nio‘s Hong Kong-listed shares closed 2% higher on Monday, while the US-listed stock was trading 1.9% higher in pre-market trading as of publication time.
ES9 as the Catalyst
The price target hike is anchored on the ES9, the brand’s new flagship SUV that opened pre-sales on April 9 at a starting price of 528,000 yuan ($77,200), with deliveries scheduled to begin on the first of June.
Deutsche Bank now expects average monthly ES9 sales to reach approximately 5,000 units once production capacity ramps up in the second half of 2026.
The bank also lifted its 2026 total deliveries forecast for Nio by approximately 5% to around 420,000 units.
Despite the increase, the bank’s target remains below the low end of the official guidance.
Nio Inc.‘s management has recently stated that it aims to reach a sales increase of between 40 and 50%, implying between 456,000 and 489,000 EVs delivered worldwide this year.
Separately, Deutsche Bank cut its full-year 2026 net loss forecast for Nio by 49.6% to 3.665 billion yuan ($505 million), reflecting the combined impact of higher volume assumptions, better operating leverage from premium-segment scaling, and improving margins.
Nio Inc.‘s main target for this year is to post its full year of profitability.
The ES9 takes over as Nio‘s flagship SUV from the ES8, which has held that position since becoming the brand’s first mass-produced vehicle in May 2018.
A Year of Climbing Targets
Monday’s revision is the latest in a sequence of Deutsche Bank price target increases on Nio over the past year, all backed by a Buy rating maintained throughout.
In August 2025, the bank raised its target to HKD 75 from HKD 71, citing stronger-than-expected demand for the new ES8 flagship at its anticipated competitive pricing of around 399,000 yuan, alongside a minor cut to the bank’s 2025 net loss forecast.
Three months later, Deutsche Bank lifted the target further to HKD 82, attributing the move to record-high October sales — including approximately 40,000 cumulative ES8 deliveries by that point — and improving gross margins approaching the 13% to 14% range.
The target was trimmed to HKD 72 in early 2026 amid broader China EV pricing competition before recovering to HKD 73.3 on March 2, after a Nio subsidiary completed a roughly 2.257 billion yuan capital raise that lowered financing costs and trimmed the bank’s 2026 net loss forecast by approximately 0.9%.
Monday’s revision to HKD 80 represents the bank’s third upward adjustment in nine months.
Nio confirmed in February that it had achieved its first profitable quarter ever, with founder and Chief Executive William Li telling analysts the company is targeting full-year profitability in 2026.
The Q4 2025 vehicle margin was 18.1%, up roughly five percentage points year-over-year, with the ES8 contributing the bulk of the improvement at a model-specific gross margin of 20%.
The estimated delivery wait for the third-generation ES8, when configured with the entry-level Executive Luxury Edition, fell to 1-2 weeks as of Monday, the lowest level since the model launched in late September with an initial 24-26 week backlog.
Nio is scheduled to report first-quarter 2026 results in late May.
