With the pricing of the new Aito M5 announced, it's almost certain that models in the 250,000-300,000 RMB range will tacitly lock their prices. It's not about protecting gross margins, but rather that further price wars would yield diminishing returns. If everyone knows you adjust prices every two weeks, they might as well wait until the end of the year to buy—this creates a terrifying waiting black hole.

For these cars, there's no need to aggressively undercut themselves for market share. Even joint-venture competitors with far fewer features are already pricing at their premium levels, creating absurdly inflated value propositions.

The only wildcard is autonomous driving. Among the top-selling models in this segment—the L6, M5, and SU7—the full autonomous driving packages are all priced around 280,000-300,000 RMB. To put that in perspective, it's similar to adding FSD to a Model 3 or getting basic driver assistance on a Model Y. Even if Tesla were to halve FSD prices or make entry-level assistance free, these three models would still hold a clear functional advantage at the same price point. Of course, if that really happened, BYD would be laughing the hardest—after all, if everyone else is self-destructing, it's happy to watch the show.

Everyone knows how this script will play out, so staying cautious and not overstepping is the safest strategy.

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