Summary: Sales of domestically manufactured Japanese brand vehicles in August

Due to its position just before the start of the school year and prior to the week-long Chinese National Day holiday, August has traditionally been a strong month for the Chinese automobile market. This year was no exception, with monthly sales of Chinese-made passenger automobiles totaling 1.06 million units, growing 12.5 percent from last August. However, due to a variety of factors, August sales of domestically manufactured Japanese brand passenger automobiles finished at just 217,300 units, a fall of 3.4 percent from a year ago. Japanese brands were the only segment of passenger automobiles to see their sales decrease.

Backlash from the recent territorial disputes between China and Japan, which has led to demonstrations encouraging boycott of Japanese goods, has been attributed as the major factor behind the sales fall. The recent decision by the government of Guangzhou to restrict new automobile sales in the city is also another key factor behind declining sales.

Looking at figures from the beginning of the year, sales of domestically manufactured Japanese brand passenger automobiles from January to August totaled 1.82 million units. The figure represents year-on-year growth of 9.1 percent. By comparison, sales of German brand passenger automobiles over the eight month period totaled 1.85 million units, growing 21.3 percent from the previous year. Last year sales of Japanese brand passenger vehicles exceeded those of German branded ones.

Looking at the three key vehicle segments, the market for Japanese brand minivan was the only one which managed to sustain positive year-on-year growth this August. That growth was mainly due to increasing sales of the Guangqi Toyota Verso and the introduction of the new Dongfeng Honda Elysion. Sales of other minivans fell from last August. Cumulative sales figures for January to August showed similar results. Sales of the Verso over doubled during the eight month period, finishing just behind Guangqi Honda's Odyssey.

In the SUV segment, the Toyota RAV4 was the only model whose sales grew in August. Aside from Dongfeng Nissan's new Murano, monthly sales of all other SUV models fell from August 2011 to August 2012. Dongfeng Honda's CR-V was the best selling SUV over the first eight months of the year, followed by Dongfeng Nissan's Qashqai and the RAV4.