German sports car maker Porsche has announced it has significantly reduced its exposure to the Chinese market, while operating profit recovered during the first nine months of the year, despite falling revenue and vehicle deliveries. The company, owned by Volkswagen, published third-quarter results on Tuesday, saying operating profit reached 1.74 billion euros in the first nine months of 2026, compared with 40 million euros in the same period last year, when it recorded around 2.7 billion euros in expenses for its strategic restructuring.
Meanwhile, sales revenue fell 5.9% to 25.28 billion euros, while deliveries continued to decline, dropping 16% to 178,532 units. North America remained Porsche’s largest sales region by volume. China has historically been an important market for German luxury car makers, but they have faced growing competition from local brands, especially in the electric vehicle segment. Porsche’s sales in China have fallen significantly in recent years amid intensified competition from brands such as BYD, Geely and Xiaomi.
Jochen Breckner, Porsche’s chief financial officer, said in the Tuesday results call that “our geographically balanced sales footprint continues to provide stability in different markets.” He added: “As you know, we have significantly reduced our exposure to China. This makes our business overall less dependent on developments in this challenging market environment.” Porsche is also cutting thousands of jobs as part of a broader restructuring aimed at reducing costs and responding to weaker demand. Porsche shares were trading 2.3% higher.
Analysts at Citi noted in a Tuesday note that Porsche’s results for the first nine months were as expected, despite challenges, including China. They added that “despite challenging conditions, including exceptionally low deliveries, higher costs and higher deliveries of battery electric vehicles, Porsche’s core EBIT remains very resilient and ahead of German premium peers.” The analysts said Porsche has presented a plan to return to double-digit core operating profit margins, with recovery expected to begin in 2028, and net cash flow is expected to recover above IPO levels by 2031.
Source: CNBC