How Chinese OEMs perform in 13th-month-in-a-row national sales downturn?

New automobile purchases in China have declined for 13 straight months by the end of July, 2019. Facing the market wane, how Chinese OEMs performed respectively last month?

SAIC Motor

SAIC Motor reported July sales of 439,794 units, posting a decline of 9.29% over a year ago, versus the 15.97% year-on-year decrease in June sales.

For the first seven months, cumulative vehicle sales and outputs of the Shanghai-based automaker slid 15.73% and 21.04% year over year respectively to 3,377,090 units and 3,242,490 units.

As to the sales for the month of July, the top three subsidiaries—SAIC Volkswagen, SAIC-GM and SAIC-GM-Wuling—were all hit by negative year-on-year growth. However, SAIC Motor PV and SAIC Maxus saw their July sales climb 8.14% and surge 48.85% respectively.

Apart from SAIC GM Wuling Indonesia Co.,Ltd and MG Motor India, which was newly added into the report from August on, the other subsidiaries all suffered year-on-year downturn in year-to-date sales.

Dongfeng Motor Group

Dongfeng Motor Group sold 1,595,309 new vehicles through July, posting a year-on-year decrease of 5.94%. Of that, year-to-date PV sales dropped 7.8% to 1,323,352 units, while CV sales climbed 4.28% from a year earlier to 271,957 units.

For the month of July, the auto group saw its monthly sales jumped 18.77% over the prior-year to 220,869 units with both PV and CV sectors achieving positive growth. Particularly, its PV sales impressively rose 20.94% to 189,373 units despite the downturn in overall PV market countrywide.

Regarding Jan.-Jul. sales of each subsidiary or brand, both Dongfeng Infiniti and Dongfeng Honda boasted double-digit growth compared with the same period a year ago. Meanwhile, the sales mainstay Dongfeng Nissan sold 609,437 vehicles during the first seven months with a slight increase of 0.47%.

However, Dongfeng Peugeot Citroen Automobile Company LTD (DPCA) was still trapped in a negative status. For the first seven months, the Sino-French joint venture witnessed its sales plunge 56.56% from the year-ago period. Nevertheless, the decrease in its monthly sales was shrunk to 14.85% in July from 54.3% in June.

GAC Group

GAC Group reported a July auto sales volume of 158,052 units with a year-on-year decrease of 6.89%. Meanwhile, its vehicle outputs during the same period slid 14.98% to 166,392 units.

The Guangzhou-based auto group also said that it had sold 1,157,612 vehicles through July, a slight drop of 2.44% compared with the corresponding period in 2018. Meanwhile, its year-to-date outputs dip 10.36% to 1,114,549 units.

Both two major Sino-Japanese joint ventures—GAC Honda and GAC Toyota—achieved double-digit growth in year-to-date sales.

In July, GAC Honda saw its auto sales shrink 8.6% to 51,871 units, while GAC Toyota still maintained a rising momentum in July sales.

GAC Group claimed that July sales of its NEV business arm GAC NE zoomed up 153% year on year to 3,406 units, the first time ever exceeding 3,000 units on a monthly basis. 

Changan Automobile

Changan Automobile posted a year-on-year decline of 7.1% in July sales, the automaker reported on August 12.

Monthly sales of the Chongqing-based automaker for the first six months were all decreased over 20% from the previous year, according to the former sales data collected by Gasgoo.

The contracted decline in July sales should be attributable to the ascending performance of Chongqing Changan and Changan Mazda, which achieved 24.3% and 18.2% year-on-year increase respectively over the prior-year.

Meanwhile, Changan Ford saw its July sales significantly grow 19.9% from the previous month, and its year-on-year drop also shrank to 24.5%, versus 44.5% of decline in June sales.

The automaker announced via its WeChat account that its self-owned vehicles sales reached 82,791 units in July.

However, the company's year-to-date sales as of July still slumped 29.3% compared with the same period a year ago.

Geely Automobile

Geely Automobile announced on August 7 that its total sales volume (including Lynk & Co-branded vehicles) in July 2019 reached 91,375 units, a year-on-year decrease of roughly 24%, while up by around 1% from the previous month.

Of the total sales for the month of July, 4,476 units came from new energy and electrified vehicles (NEEVs). The hotter-selling NEEV models were the Emgrand EV, the Jiaji MHEV, the Xingyue MHEV and the Geometry A, which together accounted for around 65% of total monthly NEEV sales.

Year-to-date NEEV sales skyrocketed 181% from a year earlier to 62,076 units, said the automaker.

For the first seven months, sales volume of Geely Automobile totaled 743,055 units, dropping approximately 16% compared with the same period a year ago. By the end of July, the group has already fulfilled 55% of its revised annual sales target—1,360,000 units—in 2019.

Great Wall Motors

Great Wall Motors sold 60,357 vehicles in July, boasting a double-digit year-on-year growth of 11.09%, the automaker said on August 8.

Both two SUV brands achieved positive year-on-year increase in July sales—15% for Haval and 2.34% for WEY. However, when we check the detailed sales volume of specific models, we can discover that a large part of models for both Haval and WEY were actually hit by decrease over the previous year.

The energy that enabled the ultimate growth primarily came from the outstanding sales performance of several new models. The combined sales of the Haval F5 and F7—both of them went on sale after August 2018—totaled 9,489 units, accounting for roughly 22% of total Haval’s sales.

The new energy vehicle (NEV) brand ORA also pumped fresh blood for Great Wall Motors. Nevertheless, sales of the ORA R1 and iQ, amounting to 1,677 units and 394 units in July respectively, were sharply decreased compared with the previous month.

Chery Holding

Chery Holding sold roughly 49,000 vehicles in July, of which car sales of Chery Automobile presented growth from both the previous year and the previous month.

For the first seven months, Chery Holding's vehicle sales reached 373,000 units in total, among which sales of self-owned brands climbed 6.2% over the prior-year, still maintaining growth again.

Propelled by such hotter-selling models as the all-new Tiggo 8, the Tiggo 5 x HERO, the Arrizo GX Pro and the Arrizo 5 Pro which hit the market in recent months, Chery Automobile saw its sales in July grow 7.9% from the previous year.

Jetour, a car brand launched by Chery Holding under Chery Commercial Vehicle, achieved a slight year-on-year growth of 2% with 8,170 vehicles sold in July. Particularly, cumulative sales of the Jetour X70 have exceeded 100,000 units since it hit the market in August 2018.

BYD

BYD said on August 7 that its auto sales for the first seven months edged down 1.05% year on year to 259,057 units. Meanwhile, vehicle sales in July notably declined 16.96% over the previous year.

The sales drop should be primarily attributable to the oil-fueled vehicle sales downturn. In July, BYD sold 14,418 fuel-burning vehicles, suffering an evident year-on-year decrease of 22.16%. As to cumulative sales so far this year, the decline even reached up to 42.41%.

It is noteworthy that the automaker's new energy vehicle (NEV) sales in July dropped 11.84% from a year ago to 16,567 units, the first-time downturn for 2019. It was also decreased by 37.65% compared with the previous month mainly because a large amount of market demands had been overdrawn before a three-month grace period for new NEV subsidy policy ending June 25.

Sales of new energy PVs slid 12.05% year on year to 16,010 units in July. Of that, PHEV sales slumped 35.22%, while BEV sales still apparently grew 16.38%.

JAC Motors

It seems that JAC Motors suffered a tough month after it was fined for emission fraud.

Last month, the Hefei-based automaker sold 27,555 vehicles, posting a sharp year-on-year decline of 27.29%. Its cumulative sales as of July fell 9.46% to 262,710 units.

PV sales in July plunged 51.77% year over year to 9,856 units, among which sales of sedans, SUVs and MPVs tumbled 77.49%, 44.6% and 41.85% respectively to 1,071 units, 6,691 units and 2,094 units.

Besides, JAC Motors saw its export volume in July slump 70.85% over the previous year to 3,585 units. Affected by the latest negative performance, year-to-date exports steeply dropped 45.94% to 28,620 units.

The promising NEV sector was hit by severe downturn as well. In July, sales of all-electric PVs plummeted 66.5% to only 1,738 units.