August 2020 update: retail sales of four Japanese automakers in China

Shanghai (Gasgoo)- For the month of August, both Toyota and Honda sustained double-digit growth in their China deliveries. Nissan and Mazda failed to gained increase, while only faced year-on-year decrease below 3%.

Regarding year-to-date performance, Toyota was the only one that garnered growth. The other three all posted smaller drop compared to the previous month.

Toyota's China sales leap 27.2% in August

Toyota saw its China sales jump 27.2% from the previous year to 164,400 units in August, making the year-to-date volume total 1,083,100 units (+4.3% YoY).

(Avalon, photo source: FAW-Toyota)

For the first eight months, Toyota has completed 61.54% of the 1.76 million-unit sales target it set for China business in 2020.

The premium car brand Lexus sold 20,698 vehicles in China last month, a 22.3% robust growth over the year-ago period. Of those, 8,403 units were electrified vehicles.

FAW-Toyota announced an Aug. delivery volume of 72,110 units, exceeding 70,000 units for the fourth month in a row. A total of 12,366 consumers in China took delivery of the Avalon sedans.

According to the data offered by GAC Toyota, the joint venture's Aug. sales amounted to 70,247 units, jumping 19% over a year ago, and its Jan.-Aug. sales rose 10% to 462,632 units.

The vehicles sold last month included 7,353 Wildlander compact SUVs (26% of which were HEVs), 8,259 Highlander SUVs, 4,763 C-HR SUVs, 21,022 Levin sedans and 17,526 Camry sedans.

Honda's China deliveries grow 19.7% from prior-year period in August

Honda saw its China deliveries jumped 19.7% year on year to 148,636 units last month, the highest-ever Aug. volume the Japanese automaker has achieved in the world's largest auto market.

The double-digit growth should be equally credited to the upturn achieved both two joint ventures. GAC Honda's deliveries also leapt 19.7% from a year earlier to 71,143 units, while Dongfeng Honda scored a 19.8% robust increase with 77,493 vehicles delivered in August.

(Breeze, photo source: GAC Toyota)

Thanks to the two-digit increase in both Jul. and Aug. deliveries, Honda's decrease in Jan.-Aug. China deliveries contracted to 9%, versus the 13.1% decline in Jan.-Jul. volume.

For the first eight months, GAC Honda and Dongfeng Honda delivered 455,362 units (-8.1% YoY) and 441,927 units (-9.8% YoY) respectively.

There were four models from GAC Honda—the Accord, the Vezel, the Breeze and the Crider—whose respective deliveries all exceeded 10,000 units in August.

As for Dongfeng Honda's products, the respective deliveries of the Civic, the CR-V and the XR-V all topped 10,000 units last month. Notably, both Civic and CR-V had Aug. retail sales exceeding 20,000 units. The sales of the Civic had been above 20,000 units for five consecutive months.

Nissan sees Aug. China sales drop 2.4% year on year

Nissan Motor Co.,Ltd. said its sales in China edged down 2.4% from a year ago to 126,592 vehicles. However, compared to July, it still gained a 4.7% growth.

Selling 843,879 vehicles in total, the automaker recorded an 11.8% decline in China sales for the first eight months, 1.4 percentage points lower than the decrease in Jan.-Jul. volume.

(X-Trail, photo source: Dongfeng Nissan)

The PV business unit of Dongfeng Motor Company Limited (DFL) saw its Aug. sales slid 2.9% year over year to 105,395 units. Within DFL, Dongfeng Nissan sold 100,287 vehicles (including the sales of imported vehicles models), a slight year-on-year growth of 0.3%. As of August, the joint venture had garnered increase for the fifth month in a row.

As for the specific performance of products, the sales of the seven-generation Altima and the Sylphy jumped 11.8% and 43% over a year earlier to 11,693 units and 46,688 units respectively, both hitting their best-ever Aug. volume. Besides, Dongfeng Nissan sold 15,304 X-Trail and 14,061 Qashqai vehicles, which served major driving forces for the joint venture's SUV unit.

Mazda's China business records 2.3% year-on-year drop in Aug. deliveries

Mazda Motor (China) Co.,Ltd. reported a retail sales volume of 17,327 units in August, a year-on-year decrease of 2.3%.

The downturn should be completely attributed to the plunge in FAW-Mazda's sales. Last month, the joint venture saw its deliveries plunge 35% from a year ago to 5,013 units, which were also 26.3% fewer than that of the previous month.

(All-new Mazda CX-4, photo source: FAW-Mazda)

With 3,293 units delivered, FAW-Mazda's CX-4 was the second best-selling model among those Mazda currently sells in China. Its Jan.-Aug. delivery volume amounted to 31,655 units.

Retailing 12,314 vehicles, Changan Mazda boasted a robust 23% year-on-year leap in August, which significantly counteracted the decrease caused by FAW-Mazda.

Last month, Changan Mazda's Mazda3 Axela was once again honored the best-selling model within Mazda's China product lineup. The Mazda CX-5 took the second runner-up place, which was outperformed by the CX-4 by only 249 units.

For the first eight months of the year, Mazda saw its cumulative China deliveries fall 6.2% from a year ago to 132,407 units. To be specific, FAW-Mazda and Changan Mazda delivered 52,196 units (-3.2% YoY) and 80,211 units (-8% YoY) respectively.