UPDATE:China May Auto Sales Up 34% On Year At 1.12 Million Units
09 Juni 2009 - 12:59PM
Dow Jones News
Beijing's policies to support China's auto market drove sales up
34% in May, according to data issued Tuesday by a semi-official
industry group, as the country remained a standout in the
struggling global car industry.
Auto sales last month totaled 1.12 million units, the China
Association of Automobile Manufacturers said. In contrast, U.S. car
sales fell 34% in May to 925,824 units.
"Based on the current momentum, sales this year will easily
reach 10 million units," said Global Insight analyst John Zeng.
"For this year, there is no question about growth."
China's auto sales in 2008 rose 6.7% to 9.38 million units.
Sales in the first five months of this year rose 14.3% from year
earlier to 4.96 million units, according to the CAAM data, the
first time China's car sales growth has hit double digits this
year.
The latest data show Chinese consumers are still responding to
government measures implemented early this year to boost small car
sales, which included subsidies and a purchase tax cut. For
example, sales of minibuses, a segment that benefits from the
policies, rose 84% in May from a year earlier to 172,600 units.
Sales of other vehicle segments have also been growing.
Passenger car sales rose 42.4% from a year earlier to 591,300
units, while sales of sport-utility vehicles rose 25.8% to 47,700
units, CAAM said.
Car sales in China are soaring even as sales in developed
markets are falling. New-car registrations in Japan fell 19% in May
to 178,503 units and new car registrations in Europe dropped 12% to
1.25 million units in April.
Zeng said the lasting impact of the measures has surprised some
in the industry. Forecasts by analysts and industry officials early
this year called for flat or low-single digit growth for 2009.
Auto sales growth has also outstripped growth in China's retail
sales. Retail sales in April, the last month for which data are
available, rose 14.8% while auto sales that month rose 25% to 1.15
million units.
China's auto market has likely peaked for the year, said Zeng,
who added that there are already signs this month of a slowdown in
sales. The summer months are traditionally slow, he said.
Zeng said the biggest beneficiaries of the government policies
are General Motors Corp.'s (GM) commercial vehicle joint venture in
China, SAIC-GM-Wuling Automobile Co., and Chongqing Changan
Automobile Co. (000625.SZ).
Consumers who buy the Wuling Sunshine and Wuling Rong Guang
minivans and Changan Star minibuses qualify for the government
incentives because of the models' small engines.
-By Patricia Jiayi Ho, Dow Jones Newswires; (8610) 6588 5848;
patricia.ho@dowjones.com