Shares of Chinese electric vehicle maker NIO (NYSE: NIO) touched a fresh 52-week low of $3.48 during Tuesday's trading session before pulling back to around $3.40, a decline of roughly 6% on the day. The stock had closed at $3.59 in the prior session, and turnover was heavy, with approximately 4.9 million shares changing hands.

The sell-off came one day after NIO announced a new partnership with Chinese automaker Geely. Under the terms of the deal, Geely will acquire a 30% stake in NIO Power, the company's battery-swapping and charging subsidiary. Geely is paying approximately RMB640 million ($95 million) in cash, with its own charging business, Yiyi Power, also forming part of the consideration, a structure that brings Geely's charging network under the same roof as NIO's battery-swap operations.

The agreement values NIO Power at roughly RMB16 billion, or about $2.4 billion — equal to roughly 28% of NIO's total market capitalization of $8.47 billion. NIO China will retain a controlling 63.6% interest in the unit once the transaction closes. The deal is structured so that Geely's ownership could subsequently rise to 34% under certain conditions, although it could also fall to as low as 20% if the unit underperforms, meaning the automaker's eventual stake is not fixed at closing.

NIO CEO William Li framed the arrangement as a way to eliminate duplicated spending across the industry. He called on other Chinese automakers to share charging and battery-swap infrastructure rather than each building out competing networks of their own. The appeal underscores how capital-heavy charging and swap networks have become a source of duplicated cost across China's auto industry, and whether other manufacturers follow Li's lead is one of the threads to watch as the partnership takes effect.

Delivery Growth Continues

Despite the pressure on the shares, NIO's delivery figures have continued to move in the right direction. The company delivered 35,836 vehicles in August, an increase of 14.5% from a year earlier, a pace that stands in sharp contrast to where the stock has been trading. The monthly total was split across the group's three brands. The core NIO brand delivered 21,174 vehicles, more than doubling from last year, while the ONVO brand added 8,810 units and the Firefly brand delivered 5,852, up 34.7%.

For the first eight months of 2026, cumulative deliveries reached 262,893 units. That marks a 57.9% increase compared with the same period last year.

Second-Quarter Numbers Tell a Mixed Story

NIO's second-quarter results, released on September 1, presented a mixed picture. Revenue climbed 69.1% year-over-year to RMB32.1 billion, or approximately $4.74 billion, while vehicle margins held steady at 18.5% even as raw material and chip costs rose. The company posted an adjusted net profit of RMB26.1 million, its third consecutive profitable quarter on an adjusted basis. Even so, the adjusted per-share loss of 27 cents fell short of Wall Street's forecast for a loss of 21 cents.

Management highlighted the ES8 SUV as a bright spot, saying the model is on pace to reach 150,000 cumulative deliveries this month. Looking ahead, NIO guided for 108,000 to 111,000 vehicles in the third quarter — an average of roughly 36,000 to 37,000 per month, just above the August pace — and set a goal of averaging more than 40,000 monthly deliveries in the fourth quarter, a step up that would require volumes to keep climbing. Upcoming monthly delivery reports will show whether the company is tracking toward those marks.

Wall Street Remains Divided

Analyst opinion on the stock shows no clear consensus. According to data tracked by MarketBeat, six analysts rate the stock a Buy, seven rate it a Hold and two rate it a Sell, producing an average rating of Hold and an average price target of $5.87 across 15 analysts.

Recent rating changes have gone in both directions. Goldman Sachs reissued a Buy rating with a $6.10 price target on September 4, and Citigroup restated its Buy rating on September 1. On the other side of the ledger, Freedom Broker cut NIO from Strong Buy to Hold on September 2, and RBC lowered its rating to Sector Perform the following day. Weiss Ratings has maintained a Sell rating on the stock since late July.

From a technical standpoint, NIO's shares now trade below both their 50-day moving average of $4.24 and their 200-day moving average of $5.16, levels traders commonly use as quick gauges of shorter- and longer-term trend. The company's market capitalization at $8.47 billion, with a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.11 and a current ratio of 1.02.

This article is based on reporting by CoinCentral: NIO Stock Hits New 52-Week Low: Here's Why.