Recently, a number of car companies and brands have announced April car sales. Judging from the announced enterprises and brands, the sales of car companies generally rose in April, a gratifying year-on-year increase.
Overall improvement, new power car companies are still "ferocious"
April is the off-season in the traditional market, coupled with the gradual recovery of car production and sales in April last year, the impact of high growth brought about by a low base has significantly weakened, and car sales failed to continue the previous high growth trend in April this year. But even so, as the market demand is still picking up after the epidemic, new energy vehicles continue to grow rapidly, the overall car market environment is still relatively good, and overall sales are still developing well. According to the China Automobile Association, car sales reached 2.252 million in April, up 8.6 per cent from a year earlier, while cumulative sales in the first four months reached 8.748 million, up 51.8 per cent from a year earlier.
In contrast, the vast majority of car companies achieved positive sales growth in April.
Several major domestic automobile groups, such as SAIC, Changan Automobile, GAC GROUP and Dongfeng Group, have shown varying degrees of growth. SAIC is still the company with the highest sales. According to sales data, SAIC sold a total of 419519 new cars in April, up 0.5 per cent from a year earlier, and accumulated sales of 1561929 vehicles in the first four months, up 42.4 per cent from a year earlier. Among the main brands of SAIC Group, SAIC passenger cars and SAIC Chase performed well, of which SAIC passenger cars sold 54100 vehicles in April, up 30.3 per cent from a year earlier, and cumulative sales reached 199355 in the first four months, up 41.5 per cent from a year earlier.
Compared with the above major automobile groups, although there is still a large gap in the volume of new car-building forces, such as Lulai Automobile, ideal Automobile, Xiaopeng Automobile, and so on, the growth momentum is very "ferocious."
The delivery volume of Lulai reached 7102 in April, an increase of 125.1 per cent over the same period last year. It is said that this is the Lai car to overcome the impact of chip shortage, the third monthly delivery of more than 7000 vehicles this year. As of April 30, the cumulative delivery volume of Lulai has reached 102803.
Ideal delivered 5539 new cars in April, up 111.3% from a year earlier. By the end of April, the cumulative delivery of ideal new cars had reached 51715. It is reported that since the first ideal ONE was delivered to users in December 2019, to the delivery of 50, 000 vehicles, the ideal car took only 17 months, setting a record for the fastest delivery of new cars. At present, ideal ONE users have spread to 331 cities in 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the Central Government.
Xiaopeng's total delivery volume in April was 5147, an increase of 285% over the same period last year, and has doubled for 10 consecutive months compared with the same period last year. By the end of April, Xiaopeng's cumulative delivery volume in 2021 had reached 18487, five times that of the same period last year. According to Gesco, the product array of Xiaopeng automobile continues to expand this year, the delivery of the P7 wing version has been started at the end of March, and the lithium iron phosphate battery version Xiaopeng G3 and Xiaopeng P7 have also been delivered in April and May this year. Xiaopeng P5 has started booking during the Shanghai Auto Show and is scheduled to start delivery in the fourth quarter of this year. With the help of these new products, its sales are expected to continue to rise.
In addition, new forces such as Zero and Naga also achieved rapid sales growth in April.
The influence of lack of core continues to appear, and the performance of automobile enterprises tends to be divided.
At present, the problem of lack of core affects the nerves of the whole automobile industry. In fact, more and more car companies have stopped production for a short time because of lack of core. From the perspective of sales volume, the impact of lack of core is also continuing to appear. As mentioned earlier, as far as the overall April car market is concerned, growth is still the main theme, but it is worth noting that the performance of specific car companies varies due to factors such as the intensity affected by the chip shortage.
Take Changan Automobile as an example. Changan Automobile sold 202280 vehicles in April, up 26.8 per cent from a year earlier, while cumulative sales in the first four months were 843342, up 82.3 per cent from a year earlier. It can be seen that the overall sales volume of Changan Automobile is growing faster than the same period last year, outperforming the industry average. However, when it comes to the performance of its companies, there are some differences.
Sales of Changan's own brands continued to grow at a high rate, reaching 166001 vehicles in April, up 39 per cent from a year earlier, according to the data. In sharp contrast to its performance, sales of Changan Ford and Changan Mazda declined to varying degrees in April compared with the same period last year. Changan Ford sold 15363 new cars in April, down 24.9% from a year earlier, while Changan Mazda sold 11302 new cars in April, down 3.9% from a year earlier.
According to the relevant analysis of Oriental Securities, the sales performance of Changan Ford and Changan Mazda declined in April, which is most likely related to the shortage of chip supply. It is understood that Ford recently announced that a shortage of chips may lead to a 50% reduction in production in the second quarter. As early as February this year, Mazda said it was considering reducing production. It is said that the "lack of core" has affected not only the production of Mazda's Japanese plants, but also its production lines in China and Mexico.
Let's take a look at GAC GROUP. In April, GAC GROUP's sales reached 187096, an increase of 12.5% over the same period last year. In the first four months, cumulative sales reached 683, 656, an increase of 44.7% over the same period last year. Specifically, GAC sold 25700 vehicles in April, up 40.5 per cent from a year earlier, while Honda sold 70972 vehicles in April, down 1.1 per cent from a year earlier. Oriental Securities analysts believe that the growth rate of GAC Honda sales is lower than the industry average, mainly affected by the shortage of chips.
The export environment is relatively stable, and automobile exports continue to strengthen.
According to the China Automobile Association, automobile exports reached an all-time high in April, with 151000 vehicles exported in a single month, an increase of 13.7 percent from the previous month and a 1.1-fold increase over the same period last year. Exports totaled 516000 vehicles in the first four months, up 88.1 percent from the same period last year. Car association data also show that in April, the association exported 107000 passenger vehicles to CKD, an increase of 146% over the same period last year.
Thus it can be seen that the overall performance of China's automobile exports was relatively strong in April. Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the bus Federation, pointed out that in April, the world epidemic situation was repeated, and there was great uncertainty in the repair of overseas industrial chains, and the epidemic situation in countries represented by India was grim, but the epidemic situation in Europe and the United States was better controlled, which stabilized the better situation of China's exports.
From the perspective of automobile companies, the export growth of SAIC, Geely Automobile, Great Wall Automobile and Chery Automobile is more obvious.
SAIC sold 42900 vehicles overseas in April, up 62.6 per cent from a year earlier, according to data. Specifically, overseas sales of the MG brand increased by 93% in April compared with the same period last year, continuing to rank first among China's export single car brands. SAIC Chase MAXUS overseas sales exceeded 100000 vehicles, reaching more than 10,000 sales in Europe, Australia, New Zealand and the Americas.
Geely sold a total of 100331 new cars in April, down from the same period last year, but Geely continued to grow at a high rate in terms of exports. Geely exported 8578 new cars that month, a surge of 96.47 per cent over the same period last year. So far, Geely exported a total of 35995 new cars in the first four months, an increase of 191.1 percent over the same period last year.
In April, Great Wall Motor sold 91784 new cars, a year-on-year increase of 14%, of which domestic sales were 82703, up 5% from the same period last year, and overseas sales were 9081, up 349% from the same period last year. According to a report by (AEB), an European business association, Great Wall sold 3001 new cars in Russia in April, up 6 per cent from a month earlier and up 606 per cent from a year earlier.
Chery Group exported 22034 cars in April, up 312.5% from a year earlier, pushing up its monthly export record so far this year. It is reported that with the in-depth layout of the globalization strategy, Chery's products have entered Russia, Brazil, Saudi Arabia and other overseas markets. Today, Chery Group's automotive products have been sold to more than 80 countries and regions around the world, with a total export of nearly 1.8 million vehicles, ranking first in the export of Chinese-branded passenger cars for 18 years in a row.
The problem of lack of core is difficult to solve in the short term, and the pressure on the growth of the car
In April, the impact of lack of core on the automotive industry continues to show, in the next few months, the corresponding impact may be further enhanced. Chen Shihua, deputy secretary general of the China Automobile Association, said frankly a few days ago that the problem of chip shortage is still relatively difficult to solve in the short term. At present, it will have a greater impact on sales in the second and third quarters, and it will be alleviated in the fourth quarter of this year, while the real relief will not be until the first quarter of next year.
At present, some car companies have adjusted their next sales forecasts accordingly. When it recently released its quarterly results, Xilai expected it to deliver 21000 to 22000 vehicles in the second quarter, with sales between $1.24 billion and $1.29 billion, up 5 per cent from the previous quarter and 10 per cent from the previous quarter, which was significantly slower than the 42 per cent increase in the first quarter. For such expectations, Xilai said it was mainly dragged down by a global shortage of chips.
In May alone, Cui Dongshu pointed out that there were 19 working days in May, which was the same as the same period last year, but the lack of chips affected manufacturers' production scheduling and was not conducive to retail increment. In addition, due to the follow-up effects of factors such as the Renesa fire in Japan in March, the chip supply order is relatively chaotic, resulting in a certain risk of production increment in May. The low production makes it difficult for dealers to build inventory, and the retail promotion strategy needs to speed up the pace of adjustment, which is not conducive to the increment of production and sales in May.
A fire broke out at a chip factory in Renesas on March 19 this year, and the company had said it would take about 100 days to get shipments back to normal. (photo source: Renesas)
Based on the above reasons, the growth pressure of the car market increased in May, but there are still some boosting factors in that month. Cui Dongshu said that market demand is still picking up after the epidemic. In the first quarter, the number of newly licensed drivers nationwide was 8.39 million, an increase of 5.386 million compared with the same period last year and 387000 more than the first quarter of 2019, which contributed to the subsequent consumption of cars.
In addition, he also pointed out that 60,000 new energy license plates allocated in Beijing in May will be issued, which is also a major increase in the new energy vehicle market in the next few months. "after all, many Beijing consumers have rigid demand for cars at a faster speed." and the purchase grade is more pragmatic, which will promote the growth of electric vehicles sales of Class An and above. " In addition, the implementation of the policy of new energy going to the countryside will also continue to benefit the expansion of the new energy market.
