In Italy, the dawn of June 3rd marked the beginning of an extraordinary race for incentives for electric cars, with 205 million euros (less than expected for UNRAE) of public funds sold out in just 9 hours. This event attracted unprecedented attention, even surpassing the records of Norway, the European leader in the adoption of electric vehicles. The question arises spontaneously: are we faced with an Italian electrical miracle or an inefficiency of the system?
Over the hours and days after the funds ran out, they are numerous controversies emerged, with accusations of anomalies and irregularities in the incentive distribution process. Rumors have begun to circulate among the ranks of dealerships and industry insiders possible maneuvers by rental companies and car manufacturerswho could have coordinated in advance to secure most of the available resources.
The Ministry is trying to shed light on the distribution of the incentives, but only in the next few months will we really know who benefited from them
The Ministry of Made in Italy (Mimit) responded by providing data on the distribution of requests through the online platform dedicated. On this platform, authorized dealers and resellers can enter information relating to purchase contracts, with two main steps: an initial one, with a preview of the data, and a final one, which awaits the physical arrival of the vehicle and its payment within 270 days of preliminary insertion.
Mimit statistics indicate that the 62% of reservations were made by natural personsthrough dealers, while the remainder 38% comes from legal entities, including long-term rental companies. These numbers appear to follow market trends, contrary to rumors of unequal appropriation of incentives.
Analyzing the sales of newly registered vehicles between January and May 2024, we observe an almost equal balance between private and corporate purchases (including rentals), with 11,489 sales to private individuals and 11,902 to corporate entities. This reveals an interest evenly distributed among different types of buyers.
Finally, the incentivesalthough sold out quickly, may not only have held back the electric car market but also increased desire of Italians to switch to this technology. This suggests that, perhaps, the immense response was not entirely unexpected but rather a “chain reaction” of a eager market and ready for the electric transition. With time and the actual registration of the vehicles, it will be possible to carry out further analyzes and checks on the results of this initiative.
