China's locally-made PV retail sales jump 21.2% YoY in Sept. 2022

Shanghai (Gasgoo)- In Sept. 2022, China's passenger vehicle (PV) retail sales amounted to 1.947 million units, jumping 21.2% compared to the previous year, while also climbing 2.8% from the previous month, according to the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA).

For clarity, the PVs hereby refer to the cars, MPV, SUVs, and minibuses locally produced on the Chinese mainland.

The association said the continued improvement in logistics operation and supply chain since May this year, as well as the ample car inventories all contributed to the auto sales growth. The increase in Sept. auto retail sales also partially flew from the low base volume for the year-ago period when the auto industry was struggling with chip shortage. Besides, the car purchase tax cut policy also boosted car sales to some degree.

Last month, mainstream automakers stepped up sales promotion to compensate for the sales loss caused by the coronavirus resurgence, striving to fulfill their quarterly sales targets, the CPCA noted.

There were around 290,000 luxury PVs retailed across China in Sept., representing a 45% year-on-year leap and a 15% month-on-month rise. The tax cut served as one of the major contributing factors to the premium car consumption.

Chinese indigenous PV brands recorded a combined retail sales volume of 890,000 units in Sept., which was 28% more than that of the year-ago period and also climbed 5% over the previous month.

The CPCA's data show that China's local brands accounted for 47% of the country's total PV retail volume in Sept., 2.7 percentage points higher than the prior-year level.

With about 740,000 PVs delivered last month, mainstream joint-venture brands in China attained a year-on-year growth of 8%, but logged a month-on-month decrease of 4%.

Among the top 10 automakers by Sept. PV retail sales, only three companies—SAIC Volkswagen, SAIC-GM-Wuling, and Dongfeng Nissan—faced a downward movement year-over-year. BYD ranked highest in terms of both sales volume and sales growth. Tesla China cracked the top 10 rankings with a domestic volume of roughly 78,000 units.

China's monthly PV wholesale volume reached 2.325 million units in Sept., jumping 32.3% year on year, while also rising 9.7% month on month.

With regard to the PV wholesale volume in Sept., BYD, FAW-VW, and Chery Auto occupied the first three spots among automakers in China. Notably, they were also the top 3 best-performing ones regarding year-over-year wholesales growth. Both GAC Toyota and FAW-Toyota scored an increase of over 80% over a year ago in their Sept. wholesale volume.

According to the CPCA, the wholesale volume of new energy vehicles (NEVs) in China reached around 675,000 units in Sept., soaring 94.9% from the previous year and climbing 6.2% from the previous month.

There were a total of 15 automakers whose respective NEV wholesales exceeded 10,000 units last month. The first five companies were BYD Auto (200,973 units), Tesla (83,135 units), SGMW (52,377 units), Geely Auto (39,227 units), and GAC AION (30,016 units).

Of the China-made vehicles sold by Tesla last month, 5,522 units were exported overseas, the CPCA’s data showed, indicating the U.S. EV maker sold 77,613 locally-made vehicles within China.