Tesla Motors Inc (TSLA), BYD or Toyota Motor Corporation (ADR) (TM)? What Electric Car Stock Is The Best Bet?

Toyota Motor Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:TM) and Tesla on RAV4 EV second generation

Toyota Motor Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:TM) has been quite famous with its hybrid environmentally friendly car Prius. In 2012 Consumer Reports, the Prius is ranked the most reliable and the best selling car in California with around 68,688 Prius sold. The increasing number of Prius sales was partly due to escalating gas prices in California. In 2012, Toyota Motor Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:TM) planned to sell as many as 250,000 Prius cars this year, a growth of around 5.6% compared to 2012. However, the first quarter sales volume experienced an 8.4% decline to around 55,700.

For all-electric version cars, Toyota Motor Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:TM) has partnered with Tesla to develop the second generation RAV4 EV, which was released in the U.S. in September last year. While Tesla takes care of the batteries and electric motor, Toyota takes care of the platform and body of the SUV. Interestingly, this RAV4 EV is sold only in the State of California, with only around 2,600 units produced in the first three years.

My Foolish take

Many automobile players have a lot of initiatives in the electric cars trend. Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) and Toyota Motor Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:TM) are both moving quite aggressively on this field. I do not like Tesla due to an expensive valuation. For BYD, what should be noteworthy about the company is its electric car supply to the public transportation, with the subsidy of the Chinese Government. When investing in BYD, investors are following Warren Buffett, Charlie Munger and Li Lu to mainly bet on its talented founder and chairman, Wang Chuanfu.

The article Which Electric Car Makers Should We Invest In? originally appeared on Fool.com and is written by Anh Hoang.

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