Sept car sales regain m/m growth in China

Shanghai, October 13 (Gasgoo.com) China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) said on Friday that passenger vehicles (including sedans, MPV,SUV and other cross passenger cars) in the country posted significant sales growth in September after two consecutive months’ sales slowdown, Shanghai Securities News reported today.

According to CAAM, passenger vehicle sales totaled 552,800 units in September, compared with 434,271 units in August and 488,200 units in July. However, the September PV sales still fell 1.44%, against  the 5.4% in August, from one year earlier, but the year-on-year fall in September sales was not so sharp as in the previous month.

However, the data also showed that despite passenger car sales grew 11.36% year on year in the January-September period, the growth still had a noticeable drop by 5.71% and 12.48% respectively compared to 17.07% in the first half and 23.84% of the same period of last year.
Cars of independent Chinese brands show a continual sales growth in September. The home brands sold 100,500 cars, representing 26.55%of the total car sales, said the official car industry association.

BYD made a good performance, with its F0 ranking among the top ten brand sales after the small car went on sale. BYD sales also ranked the top ten brands for the first time thanks to its F0 model. Cars of the Japanese, German, American brands occupied the top three brands by sales, respectively at 132,500, 81,900 and 47,800.

Top ten brands in the month in term of sales are Accord, Execelle, Jetta, Santana, F3, Corolla, Camry, F0, Xiali and QQ.

Top ten automakers by the first three quarters’ sales are FAW-VW, Shanghai-VW, Shanghai-GM, FAW-Toyota, Dongfeng Nissan, Chery, Guangzhou Honda, Beijing Hyundai, Geely and Changan Ford. The ten automakers totaled 2,503,300 units during the January-September period, 66.07% of the whole car sales.

Japanese car sales keep ahead of other foreign cars. Guangzhou Honda ranked the top five by selling 32,289 units. Volkswagen posted 13.1% sales growth in mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau during the first nine months of the year, compared with 30% in January-September 2007. Ford sales climbed 7% in the first three quarters compared with 30% growth a year ago.