China Sept passenger-car sales up 84% to over 1 mln

Shanghai, October 13 (Gasgoo.com) China's passenger vehicle sales surged 84% year-on-year in September to more than one million units as government stimulus measures and an economic rebound spurred demand, media reported today, citing a Chinese auto industry association.

Sales of sedans, sport-utility vehicles (SUVs) and multipurpose vehicles (MPVs) climbed to 1.015 million units, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers said in an emailed statement today, according to Bloomberg. A year earlier, sales fell 1.4% on the Beijing Olympics and the global recession.

Car sales have seen rapid growth this year to date in China, as government stimulus measures, including tax cuts for small cars, subsidies to rural buyers of vehicles, and the old-for-new vehicle trade-in, shields China from the worst of the global slowdown.

General Motors Co., the largest overseas automaker in China, more than doubled September sales from a year earlier to 181,148 vehicles. In the first nine months, it sold 1.29 million, surpassing the tally for the whole of 2008.

Volkswagen AG boosted nine-month China sales to 1.06 million vehicles, beating the 1.02 million it sold in the whole of 2008.

September sales of Ford-branded cars made by Changan Ford Mazda Automobile, Ford's passenger-car joint venture in China, more than doubled from a year earlier to 23,616 units.

China's passenger vehicle sales, including sedans, MPVs, SUVs and minivans, soared 94.7% year-on-year to 849,376 units in August.