Under the influence of the Spring Festival holiday, the sales volume of China's automobile market decreased month-on-month in February 2022, but increased rapidly compared with the same period last year. According to figures released by the China Automobile Association on March 11, China's car sales in February were 1.737 million, up 18.7% from a year earlier, down 31.4% from January to February, up 7.5% from a year earlier. Among them, sales of new energy vehicles were 334000 in February, a year-on-year increase of 1.8 times.
A reporter from the Financial Associated Press counted the February sales of 15 listed car companies, of which 12 showed year-on-year growth, accounting for 80%. China Automobile Association said that the sharp decline in month-on-month, year-on-year growth, first, new energy and automobile exports play a positive role in promoting; second, inventory replenishment demand-driven growth. However, in the face of a more complex external environment, the China Automobile Association expressed cautious optimism about the future development of the automobile industry.
Joint venture and independent differentiation caused by uneven supply of chips
In February, chip supply once again became one of the key factors affecting the production and sales of car companies. Since last year, German and Japanese brands have been affected by chip shortages, production capacity has been seriously blocked, and channel terminals have been in a state of low inventory for a long time. By 2022, the chip supply of the joint venture brand has generally improved, and while deepening inventories, sales have continued to grow, leading to an increase in the overall sales of the group.
Specifically, SAIC, Dongfeng and GAC GROUP all showed year-on-year growth of more than 30%. Among them, the German brand SAIC-Volkswagen sold 90, 000 vehicles in February, a sharp increase of 79% compared with the same period last year. SAIC-Volkswagen accumulated sales of 221000 vehicles from January to February, an increase of 62% over the same period last year. Thanks to this, SAIC's overall sales rose 31 per cent in February from a year earlier to 322000 vehicles.
Similarly, the increase in sales of Japanese brands has also led to an increase in sales of Dongfeng Group and GAC GROUP. Of these, Dongfeng Nissan / Qichen sold 85000 vehicles in February, up 50.34% from a year earlier, while Dongfeng Honda sold 59000 vehicles in February, up 26.9% from a year earlier. Guangzhou Auto Honda 57000, up 39.06%; Guangzhou Auto Toyota 50, 000, up 20.72%.
By contrast, sales of independent brands Great Wall and Changan Motor fell significantly in February. Great Wall sold 71000 vehicles in February, down 20.5 per cent from a year earlier. As for the reason for the decline in sales, Great Wall said it was mainly due to the insufficient supply of (ESP), the body electronic stabilization system produced by Bosch.
Also affected by the chip, Changan automobile CS75 series, CS55 series, escape series and other sales "bear" have not been fully released. According to the Financial Associated Press, in order to alleviate the impact of the shortage of automotive chips, Geely will also implement a supply chain replacement program in the second quarter of this year to ease the current limited capacity pressure.
It was in a state of low inventory for the whole of last year, and cars were undersold due to a shortage of chips. At present, the chip supply turns as a whole, and enterprises use this stage to replenish inventory. " Xu Haidong, deputy chief engineer of the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, said that the inventory shortage in the domestic automobile market will be more than 1 million vehicles in 2021. As long as the supply of chips is sufficient, car companies will continue to replenish the inventory so as to maintain the stability of the market.
A day earlier, the China Automobile Circulation Association released the results of the February "Automobile Dealer inventory" survey, which showed that the comprehensive inventory coefficient of automobile dealers in the same month was 1.85, up 26.7% from the previous month and 10.1% from the same period last year. The Circulation Association believes that dealers entered the replenishment stage at the end of February, and the inventory level is above the warning line.
New energy and export become the "two carriages" in the car market.
In February, the domestic new energy market remained strong, with production and sales reaching 368000 and 334000 respectively, an increase of 2.0 times and 1.8 times respectively compared with the same period last year. Among them, a total of 246000 pure electric passenger cars were sold, an increase of 154.5% over the same period last year; although the sales of plug-in hybrid passenger cars were only 75000, the increase was as high as 338.6%, which played an important role in the overall rise of the car market.
From January to February, the cumulative sales of new energy vehicles in the market reached 765000, an increase of 154.7% over the same period last year. Of these, 581000 pure electric passenger cars were sold, an increase of 138% over the same period last year, and 160000 plug-in hybrid passenger vehicles were sold, an increase of 251.1% over the same period last year.
It is worth mentioning that, relying on the good performance of new energy vehicles, BYD overtook Geely, Changan, Great Wall and other old rivals in February to become the "number one brother of its own brand". According to the data, BYD sold 88000 new energy passenger cars in February. Judging from its composition, pure electric passenger cars sold 43000, while plug-in hybrid cars surpassed pure electric ones, reaching 44000.
In the view of Cui Dongshu, secretary-general of the Federation of passengers, the rising oil price has led many consumers to switch to plug-in hybrid models with lower fuel consumption. "the purchase of fuel vehicles by ordinary consumers brings a greater psychological burden, coupled with the loss of some industries under the impact of the recent epidemic, the purchasing power of many entry-level household users has been affected to a certain extent, which has a direct impact on the market demand for traditional fuel vehicles." Cui Dongshu believes that "the rise in oil prices will play a good role in promoting the development of the global new energy vehicle market, especially will accelerate the iteration of plug-in hybrid vehicles to traditional fuel vehicles, and will bring a certain increment to the new energy vehicle market."
In fact, more and more independent brands are laying out plug-in hybrid technologies, such as BYD's DM-i system, Chery Kunpeng DHT system, Great Wall Lemon DHT system and Geely Raytheon think-tank Hi X hybrid system. Based on this, Cui Dongshu predicts that although the market share of A-class models is lower than that of A00 and B-class models in the "dumbbell" new energy market, the A-class new energy market will usher in explosive growth in plug-in hybrid models.
In addition to the pulling role of new energy vehicles, the sustained growth of the export market has also stabilized the development of the domestic car market to a certain extent. According to the China Automobile Association, automobile companies exported 180000 vehicles in February, down 21.9% from the previous month and an increase of 60.8% over the same period last year, continuing to maintain substantial growth, while the export growth of new energy vehicles accounted for 52.0%.
"affected by the current conflict between Russia and Ukraine, the external environment of the industry is more complex. In addition, factors such as chip shortage and rising raw material costs still have an impact on the production and operation of enterprises, and the task of ensuring supply and stabilizing prices is very arduous. " The China Automobile Association has maintained a cautiously optimistic attitude towards the future development of the automobile industry.
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